


saddle tramp

by dogparty



Category: Red Dead Redemption (Video Games)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Asphyxiation, Developing Relationship, Drinking, Emotional Baggage, Eventual Relationships, Graphic Depictions of Wounds, Hunting, Implied/Referenced Underage Prostitution, Implied/Referenced Underage Sex, M/M, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Period Typical Misogyny, Physical Abuse, Prostitution, Slow Burn, Smoking, Unsafe Sex, animal skinning, wound care
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-22
Updated: 2019-10-29
Packaged: 2020-05-16 05:03:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 25,129
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19311175
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dogparty/pseuds/dogparty
Summary: Quickly, Arthur dresses into the rest of his clothing, threads the familiar iron to his hip once more, secure in it's old leather holster. Flips his hat up onto his head and quietly slips out the door and into the hall, tries to hide the limp in his step. His pockets are nicely stuffed, and it wasn't an unsuccessful job by any means, but Arthur doesn't that think he could be feeling any more pathetic in that moment.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Well here's a fic that I started writing a while ago, abandoned, and have now decided to return to. If you've read any of my previous stuff, this one is going to be a bit different. It was partially inspired by an article I read about how common male relations were in the Old West, and this basic idea sprang up into my head. I'm not sure how long this will be, but future chapters will definitely be longer, think of this as a kind of prologue. (Also felt the need to clarify to anyone who might not know, 'john' is a term for a man who pays another person for sex.)

The john is pushy and curt; looks over his shoulder and fidgets with the lock of the hotel room door. He's shorter than Arthur by a scarce inch or so, thin but healthy like a rich man who could afford to sit back on his ass all day and make others earn his money for him, dressed like one too. Arthur waits for him to open the door, takes a pull off of his cigarette, stands with his back against the wall with a hand hooked over his belt. When the door is finally pulled open, the john is putting a rough hand on Arthur's shoulder; shoving him into the room, casts a nervous glance down the empty hall.

"Sit," the man commands, and Arthur complies, seating himself on the edge of the bed and leaning back onto the heels of his hands, legs spread wide. He watches as the man flits about the room, locks the door, yanking the curtains shut and undoing the buttons on his dark blue blazer, moves a nervous hand through his hair. He halts in the center of the room and pins Arthur with his dark eyes.

"Take all of your clothes off," he says, demands "and don't do nothing else."

Arthur plucks the cigarette from his lips, blows the smoke out slow. He leans over and places it on the ashtray set atop the bedside table, makes sure to flick the ash off first. Stands up and shucks his suspenders from his shoulders, works his belt open. "Sure thing," he murmurs, low.

He can already tell that tonights work is going to be rough, Arthur can't say that he's a fan of the more 'impersonal' clients, the ones who treat him like he's little more than something to release their frustrations on; no matter how good their money is. Not touching him any more than they can seem to bare, not looking him in the eye. He's plenty used to the treatment and can deal with it, sure, but it doesn't satisfy him. Not in the way that he desires when doing whore's work anyway. Once Arthur is stark naked, he turns and looks to the john expectantly, doesn't miss the way that the man's eyes dart up and down his body, purses his lips a bit. It sends a curl of warmth through his stomach.

"On your front," he says, takes a step forward and gestures to the bed, "don't say nothing, don't move, don't look at me. And don't touch me neither."

It's something that would normally have Arthur rolling his eyes and sighing, if the situation were different, if it hadn't been so long since he'd last worked a job. He picks up his cigarette before kneeling over the bed, balls of his feet on the floor. He crosses his arms out in front of him and works to finish off the cig. There's the sound of a belt clinking, and Arthur risks a glance over his shoulder as the man shuffles up behind him, the unattractive sight enough to have him grimacing privately, he looks away and keeps his eyes forward, decides to focus on the deep red curtains pulled over the windows, can see the yellow glow of street lights peaking through the cracks between them. He finishes off his cigarette and flicks it away to the floor.

The john didn't even undress himself, just took off his expensive jacket and tugged his pants down low enough to pull his dick out. 

"You better have oil or somethin'." Arthur drolls, looks over his shoulder again. The client freezes, face twisting up in slight anger. "Course I do," he snaps, voice harsh. Yanks open the drawer of the nearby bedside table, pulls out a generic looking bottle of liquid, presumably oil. "And I told you not to say nothing."

Arthur sighs, shrugs and settles back into his crossed arms. It isn't often that his trick's are totally unprepared for a shake in the sheets, that they know little more about it all than sticking their cock in a hole and having at it. He usually keeps oil or vaseline on his person whenever on a job, in case of times like that, shoved safe and hidden at the bottom of his satchel. But if someone is out seeking a fuck, he expects them to be well prepared and ready for it.

He jumps a bit when the john pushes slicked up fingers into him, takes no time in easing them in. Makes quick and impatient effort of working Arthur open, decides that's well enough before withdrawing his hand, lubes himself up then wipes his hand on the old blanket that's draped over the bed. Grips Arthur's hips hard and sinks in with a loud exhale, deep until Arthur is grunting at the pop of pressure he feels in his stomach.

It's a rigid fuck, client showing no interest in making the experience mutually pleasant, slides a hand from Arthur's hip up over his spine to grip at his shoulder. Fingers curling around to press against his collarbone, thumb against the back of his neck, pulls Arthur back against him tightly. The bed is jittering in place with the man's erratic thrusts, it's legs drag hard and loud on the old wooden floor. Arthur turns his head to the side, cheek against his forearm. Looks at the strips of light settled around the curtains again, a glowing frame of orange warmth. Wincing openly at the sharp and impassive driving of the john; he's hitting all the wrong spots, Arthur's own cock barely half hard between his body and the creaky bed beneath him. 

Arthur has had worse sex, sure, he's definitely not enjoying himself at the moment but the money in this job is good. Real good. So he takes it, let's the john use him. Hopefully he'll be done quick, and Arthur can be on his way, will likely be sore but happy to line the tithing box back at camp. Preen under whatever praise Dutch will throw his way for it. 

He lets his mind wander, tries to distract himself from the man pawing at his hips and sides, sloppily fucking into him. 

Thinks about a client that he'd bedded with not too long ago; a broad and tall man that had said very little. Just the thought of that night has his face heating up a bit, sends a much needed thrill down to his groin. It had been in some kind of mountain town, logging place. Typically small and unpopulated but there was definitely work to be had, outside of standard robberies. All these lumbermen and little to no women, not that he'd seen anyhow. Arthur had picked him up in a small box of a bar, base burner warm in his veins.

He'd been paid first and foremost, an uncommon thing, but the money spoke sweetly enough and Arthur wasn't complaining. The man had led him to his bunkhouse, hand on the small of his back, only spoken four words to Arthur during their entire turn, simple and to the point. "Let me take you."

And so Arthur let him. He'd ended up on his back; trick settled hard and close between his legs, not an inch of space between them, bodies plastered together. The john had one arm hooked under Arthur's head, pillowed close in the crook of his elbow, the other arm scooped under his back. His mouth is pressed against Arthur's temple, in his hairline, breath hot and ragged as he fucks deep and slow. Barely pulling out and pushing his hips _hard_ against Arthur's ass in a drawn out grind, stirring up his guts and punching utterly pleased groans from his throat.

Arthur himself had been unable to do anything other than cling to the sheets, debauched as the man fucked him like some kind of lover. And Arthur relished in it, felt so wanted and desired that his heart was screaming in his chest, high like a bird with heat beneath it's wings. Made his eyes water and his blood sing. Hits something deep and caged within him that craves hard on that kind of attention. Being treated so tenderly; makes him feel cared for and wanted. Even if it's by a stranger who paid for him.

He's unfortunately yanked hard out of his lovelorn thoughts when the hand on his shoulder snakes over and squeezes his neck; hard. Fingers press rough and bruising into the soft flesh, so unexpected and vicious that it has Arthur coughing harshly and jerking away, throws his weight onto his elbow and tries to twist his torso around to fume at the john.

Any words that he has are forced back down his into throat when a fist is colliding with his face, right in the mouth. Knuckles rattle his teeth, stars dance across his eyes, and he tastes blood. Fucker hits surprisingly hard for a limp wristed rich man. Arthur regains his wits and shoves himself off of the bed, forcing the john to pull out and stumble back, tripping over his pants, having fallen down to his ankles at some point. Arthur grunts when the john's prick is yanked out harshly, burning pain from his thighs to his tail bone. He whirls around on the man.

"The hell is wrong with you?!" He barks out, spits a gob of bloody saliva onto the floor and carefully touches his now throbbing jaw. He expects the man to angrily mouth off at him, for him to take his precious money and storm out, leaving Arthur with an unsuccessful take and no cash to show for his time. What he doesn't expect, is a knife.

A small but serrated blade. Glints low in the ambient light of the hotel room; the man had pulled it seemingly from nowhere, Arthur doesn't know, but doesn't have time to contemplate it as the man is storming forward, arm striking out; and blade sinking into the meat between his shoulder and left breast. "Shit!"

Adrenaline finally catches up with Arthur, he springs a leg back to kick hard at the john, sends him toppling to the floor with a loud thud, knife clattering out of his hand and sliding across the wood, out of his immediate reach. Arthur pulls himself off the bed, knees weak from the uncomfortable position and rough fucking. Hissing and glancing down at the now bleeding wound he's acquired, it's not too deep, but it's deep enough, burns like fire. Dark red blood welling out and rolling down over his chest. 

"You stupid whore," the man is sputtering as he stands, absolutely livid, his face turning a mean shade of red. "I told you not to look at me!"

"So you _stab_ me?!" Arthur yelps back, incredulous. He's dealt with some foul johns before but never quite like this one. 

The man snarls like a rabid hound and lunges for him, hands scrabbling wildly at Arthur like he's out to kill him. Arthur shoves him away with an elbow to the chest, lets out a bark of pain as the motion pulls at the fresh stab wound, sends a fresh veil of blood to spill from the narrow slit in his skin. He takes the new opening to cock his fist back, right one this time, and plows it into the johns face as hard as he can before he gets jumped again. Satisfyingly, the man sways and drops like a rock.

"Jesus," Arthur breathes, stumbles a bit and drops back down onto the bed. Instantly regrets it at the sharp pain the lances up through his ass, like a lick of lightening zapping up his spine. He catches his breath and uses the blanket to wipe the blood away from his skin, is slow and careful around the tender ripped flesh. Disgust and shame washing over him, heavy and black.

Here he is, naked as the day he was born, bleeding, body used and bruised by some deranged fool. Fresh wound in his shoulder to nurse.

He cradles his aching jaw and sneers down at the john; knocked out cold and body sprawled spread eagle on the floor, looking absolutely pathetic with his pants around his ankles, soft dick at his thigh. Arthur pushes off the bed, groans at the pain that bites his thighs and hobbles over to the chair where'd discarded his clothing and gun, steps into his union suit and only does up about half of the buttons, holds the rest close to his waist, bunched up in his fist as he steps over to his unconscious client. The man is practically drooling in his stupor. Arthur barely takes a moment to stare at the fool before he's spitting hard on him and picking his way over to where he'd laid down his fancy jacket, roots around in all of the pockets and secures a well stuffed money clip, an ornate platinum pocket watch, and a velvet coin purse

"Sorry I didn't follow your rules, partner." Arthur mocks bitterly, plucks up and digs out any other hidden valuables, stashes them away in his satchel. Holds the man's shiny gold wedding ring up to light of the bedside lamp, reflecting in a shimmering band along the honey gold loop, grimaces with a long suffering sigh but stuffs it in with the rest nonetheless. He picks up the knife and uses it to cut the fancy jacket to shreds; wads them up and presses them against his seeping wound, gingerly pulls his underwear up over his shoulders and pinning the fine material between his body and the thin cotton of the union suit.

Quickly, Arthur dresses into the rest of his clothing, threads the familiar iron to his hip once more, secure in it's old leather holster. Flips his hat up onto his head and quietly slips out the door and into the hall, tries to hide the limp in his step. His pockets are nicely stuffed, and it wasn't an unsuccessful job by any means, but Arthur doesn't think that he could be feeling any more pathetic in that moment.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 'Saddle tramp' refers to a person who drifts from town to town on horseback, I felt like it sounded like a nice double entendre lol.
> 
> Comments and the like are very much appreciated!
> 
> [tumblr](https://coyotebrush.tumblr.com)


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Super ahead of schedule on all of my work so I thought I'd pump another chapter out.

The sun is barely rising as Arthur approaches camp; a bar of white light low on the horizon. Hidden and secure in the open glade of Clemen's point, shielded between thickly crowded trees and the wide waters of Flat Iron Lake. He had wanted to return before daylight broke, Rhodes being a mere hour or so from where the gang is currently sleeping rough, he'd figured that he would have had plenty of time to slip into the town at the later hours of the night to find someone interested in his services. When it's men were practically crawling out from the bar, three sheets to the wind.

Which certainly did happen, but it just hadn't played out at all like Arthur had initially planned. He's dealt with johns in the past who liked to be 'rough' during sex; Arthur himself did not enjoy the treatment, but was willing to tolerate some light aggression, for the sake of earning money and not losing any prospective clients. Nothing that ever left him with any serious bruises, nothing that tipped over his personal pain scale. No punching, no choking, no bleeding. And yet all three of those had happened all in one trick turn.

This recent john, Rich Bastard, hadn't mentioned any proclivities toward hard behavior during fucking, hadn't mentioned any proclivities at all for that matter. Arthur had even asked him, made it clear that anything 'special' needed to be clearly laid out before the bedroom door was closed. Rich Bastard of course, barely said anything other than a curtly spat out, "I'm the one who's giving, I ain't no woman."

The attitude, Arthur could have dealt without. Personally, he preferred receiving during sex anyway, didn't care if it put him in what most seemed to see as the 'woman's place'. It scratched that deeply buried itch, to be desired like that. Made his heart go all warm and hazy.

But the night had ended in disaster, horrible streak of luck now bleeding out into yet another aspect of Arthur's life. Leaving him here, balanced almost precariously over his horse's neck, all of his weight shifted into his throbbing thighs as he holds himself up and off of the saddle, stirrups doing a hell of a job and driving his animal at a slow trot so that he doesn't aggravate all of the aches and pains that have settled into his body. The makeshift bandages over his wound have bled through, sopping with blood. He can feel the thin rivulets roll down over his stomach and collect at his belt line; and the sharp pain that radiates below his tail bone is downright embarrassing, has his face hot and shoulders up close to his ears with the shame. Figures it's going to be a rough few days with it all. 

As he enters into the shaded trail that winds down toward their camp, he eases back a little bit into the saddle, winces as even lightly sitting on the thing sends a small shock up his spine. Arthur sighs, tugs his hat lower over his brow, grimaces as he can see the shape of someone leaning against a tree up ahead, cherry glow of their cigarette a bright point of light in the blue darkness. Shouldn't be surprised that someone is on watch, should have clearly expected it, but in his haste and humiliation he'd completely forgotten.

"Who's there?" They call out gruffly as he approaches, and Arthur visibly relaxes at the voice, shoulders sagging. It's Charles. He'd hate to be facing Bill or God forbid John right now, "it's Arthur," he says, quiet, even speaking hurts, thanks to the hard punch he'd taken to the mouth. Tugs on Pearl's reins to slow her down as Charles steps away from the tree, rifle on his back, cigarette between his lips, glossy orange light illuminating his strong features. "Hey," He greets, pulls the spent cig away, stubs it out on the heel of his boot and tosses it to the side. "Didn't know you were out."

"Yeah," Arthur sighs, fidgets a bit. "Some little business, took longer than I though it would."

"Are you okay?"

A question that has Arthur blinking in surprise, stares at Charles dumbly for a few moments before responding with a muted, "huh?"

Charles makes a loose gesture up toward his own face. "You have blood on you," he explains, then frowns. "Hope you didn't stir up any trouble up in Rhodes."

Arthur looks away, sheepish. He kicks gently at Pearl's flanks to get her going forward again, she knickers a bit and sets a pace. "It was just some business, got a little dirty but I handled it." He says plainly, doesn't wait for Charles to respond, pushes his horse toward the nearest hitch and dismounts, hisses when the shock of his feet hitting the ground sends a hard snap of pain out from his lower abdomen, like he can feel it in is throat. He irritates the stab wound by bracing his left hand against his lower back, forgot that it was there. Too distracted. Groans angrily to himself and presses his forehead against his horse's shoulder, her hair soft on his skin, one hand cupped around the horn of the saddle. "You're a mess, Morgan." He says bitterly, pulls away and cautiously picks a path toward the medical wagon, takes slow and deliberate steps. Bites his lip as he moves.

Careful not to wake up Strauss or Miss Grimshaw, Arthur carefully pulls out a bottle of iodine, a wad of bandages, and a needle and thread from within the wagon, as well as an opened bottle of gin. He decides to clean himself up further away from the camp, away from prying eyes and pushy questions, should anyone happen to wake up. The thought of curling up in his cot and sinking into a much needed sleep puts a little pep in his step as he makes his way over to the shore line, the lake water curling over the sand in small gentle waves.

Once he's far enough away, Arthur is cursing at himself when he realizes that he has to sit down. He elects for the softer sand, eases himself down and slow like some kind of geriatric; blows a breath out from pursed lips, head tilted back, eyes on the stars. He dumps his supplies on the ground next to himself, as well as his hat. Carefully undoes the buttons of his shirt, face twisting up at the biting pain that it sends through his shoulder. After his shirt is removed, he's unpinning the buttons of his union suit as well, peeling it away from the wound and shucking out of it, rolling it down to his waist. He removes the shredded cloth he'd used previously to staunch the bleeding, tosses the soaked strips into the lake before him. Watches them sink and cloud the water.

He grabs the bottle of gin, unscrews the cap and tosses that into the lake as well, swallows half of the thing as quick as he can, burning as it goes down, booze dribbling down his chin and neck. Arthur exhales loudly after the long drag, sets the bottle down in the sand and just sits for a moment. Stares up hard at the sky; the sun is rising higher now, yellow blades of light flickering on the darkened water of the lake. Birds starting to wake up and sing, some darting low over the water to catch insects, a hazy early morning mist rolling in over the camp. It's all so pleasant, and it makes Arthur feel all the more pitiable and ugly. He looks down at his legs, sprawled out in front of him, upper lip curls into something mean. 

"You're a fool," he bemoans himself, "a stupid old fool."

Arthur finds a rock in the loose sand, runs his fingers over it, scoops it up and tosses it across the water as hard as he can. It's swallowed up easy by the lake, white fingers of water lick it up and sink it down in an instant. 

He sits for longer than he meant to, sups on the gin until the bottle is empty, blood starting to sizzle up a little bit. Make things easier. Before Arthur can begin treating himself, he hears someone tromping down the bank after him. Praying that it's not Dutch or Hosea, he risks a glance over his shoulder. But it's only Charles, again; he stops in his tracks when they make eye contact. 

"Ain't you on watch?" Arthur asks, quickly looks away and snatches up the bottle of iodine.

"Was," Charles tells him in that terse way of is, "Sean's on now."

That beats a sardonic chuckle out from Arthur, "really? This early?"

It's a least a stab at the tension, Charles is crossing the short distance between them, looks careful at the small wound dug out between Arthur's shoulder and pec, congealed blood smeared around it. "Surprising, I know." He says lightly, moves and settles himself down in the sand next to Arthur. "Seems Hosea beat some sense into him."

"He's beaten sense into all of us at some point," Arthur adds, his mouth quirking upward at the thought of the older man. He exhales loudly, unscrews the lid of the iodine bottle and clumsily dumps it into his wound, grimacing as he does so. Excess liquid spilling down his chest, staining his skin a dark orange-brown. "Shit."

"Need help?" Charles asks; eyes sliding from the ragged injury to the light purple bruising around Arthur's chin, the split on his bottom lip. There's blood cracked at the corners of his mouth, clumped and sticky in his facial hair.

Arthur sighs, hands Charles the bottle. "Sure," he says, tries not to mumble it out. Face heating up again, a messy mix of the gin he'd drank, embarrassment, and the proximity to the other man. Arthur liked Charles, appreciated that he didn't run his mouth or throw his weight around like a handful of the other men in the camp did. They got along well and understood each other on a good level, but Arthur found it hard to look him in the eye during quiet moments like this, not because of anything Charles had done. The blame was on himself of course.

It had been prior to the nightmare that was the Blackwater heist, three months or so ago. The gang was currently settled out on the arid lands of Hennigan's Stead, camp nestled safely in the maze like rock formations, they had just completed a very successful robbery on a wagon train, having made away with not just a healthy amount of money and shiny valuables but food and medical supplies as well. Needless to say, everyone had been in a very good mood that evening, and as the sun sank down red hot over the desert, the atmosphere became playful and joyous.

Cases of alcohol were cracked open and quickly emptied, songs were belted out in slurred voices around a crackling fire, Javier happy to provide well strummed tunes. Sean and Lenny cackling in each other's faces, arms slung around each other. Uncle trying to tell some bullshit old story of his, Dutch overlooking it all, cigar in hand, new belle hanging from his arm and looking up at him like's hung up the stars and moon just for her.

Arthur himself was particularly elated, enough hooch in his system to have him drunkenly stumbling around the camp, grinning like a chessy cat, passing hugs out to anyone that he was able to hook under his arm, chanting his way through whatever song was currently being lilted over the camp, barely knowing the words to a decent few of them but not caring in any capacity. Too damn happy and dumb and drunk to care about anything in that moment other than enjoying some leisurely time with his family.

He'd found himself approaching Charles, still somewhat new to the gang but definitely not fresh faced to this kind of life. The man had been relatively quiet and reserved throughout the festivities, drinking to himself, sat just on the outskirts of it all, watching. He had sat down heavily next to Charles, throws back the rest of his whiskey and tosses the bottle to the dirt, "how're you Charles?" He asks, neck rolling on his shoulders to look at him. Plucks at his shirt, sticking to his skin, sweating in the late night desert heat.

Charles had looked over at him, smiles just a bit. "I'm fine, Arthur." He replies smoothly, takes a swig from his own beer. Eyes out on the celebrating gang members. 

Arthur nods, and follows his gaze, still grinning "'s great, real great." He says, leans with his elbows on his knees, pulls out a pack of cigarettes, plucks one out with his teeth and offers the pack toward Charles. Charles shakes his head politely, holds up a hand "no thanks."

"Sure." Arthur shrugs and lights the cigarette, takes a heavy drag and blows the smoke out deep and casual. Leaning back over the crate he's sitting on, spreads his legs just a bit, clears his throat. Boozy and warm. "So, Charles. Are you interested in a little stitch?" He asks bluntly, looks over at the other man in an expectant fashion, cig dangling low from his lips.

Charles blinks wide at him, small quirk settling between his eyebrows. "Excuse me?"

Immediately, regret. Burning so hot and heavy that Arthur is rapidly looking away and snatching the cigarette out from his mouth, puts the thing out on the crate and throws it away. "Um," he starts, tries to find a way to explain himself. Scratches rough at his neck and wishes that he was more sober, probably wouldn't have even asked if he'd been sober. "It's uh, a thing that I do."

"A thing?"

Arthur shrugs, clears his throat and turns away, kicks at the empty whiskey bottle he'd dropped previously. "Yeah." He'd left it at that. Charles clearly wasn't interested, hopefully wasn't offended, and Arthur felt stupid. He couldn't even look at him.

"Well," Charles starts to say, seeming very put off "uh, I- no thank you." It's simple and to the point, but not nearly as angry as Arthur thought that he might be, so there was that at least. It wouldn't have been the first time that someone had blown up at an offer from Arthur. 

He had went to bed immediately after that, feeling unable to do anything other than hide away in his tent like a coward. When morning had come, bright and blinding, he'd almost forgotten about it. Almost; stomach roiling in his hangover, head pounding to the point of splitting open, neck prickling at the thought that he would have to face Charles after that. But to his relief and apparent luck, Charles seemed to act like the exchange never happened. It obviously did, he hadn't been _that_ drunk and so Arthur was left to wallow in the aftermath of it, but at least Charles didn't give him a hard time over it.

Sleeping with some of the men in the camp was not a common occurrence for Arthur, he'd only done it twice. Once with Bill, regrettably of course, and once with Javier. Not an equally regrettable experience but something that had simply happened, and was to be moved on from. 

Both had propositioned him, even paid him for it. Bill fumbling dumbly around his words and not looking Arthur in the eye, leaving Arthur to tell him to cut the shit and get it over with. They'd left the camp separately, Bill first and Arthur second. Met at a low down little saloon that also rented out rooms, had drank until they could both barely see straight and eventually stumbled up toward the room that Bill had paid for. It was thoughtless sex that Arthur barely remembered, nearly asleep in his drunkenness with Bill plastered close and sweaty to his back, practically crying while fucking him. Afterward, about a day or so once they'd sobered up and were able to actually look at each other once more, they had agreed to never do that again and to pretend that it hadn't even happened.

With Javier it was different, similar in that they'd done it away from camp, hidden away in a hotel room a few hours out from the gang's location. There'd been some communication, Javier speaking with his voice low and soft. The evening had ended with Javier on his back, Arthur seated over his thighs, fucking himself slow and deep on his cock. Javier looking up at him almost reverently, hands petting over Arthur's hips, up his stomach and over his breasts. It was... tender, and sweet. And Arthur had enjoyed it, but it was just better to remain a one time thing. No good would come of them making a habit out of it.

It had felt natural for Arthur to ask Charles if he was interested, but it just wasn't so. He'd known both Bill and Javier for years before anything had ever happened between them, and Charles wasn't just some random john off the streets. Even though Charles had never brought it up, or treated Arthur any differently afterward, Arthur himself just couldn't let it go. Was happy and fine to spend time with him, sure, but thoughts of his past fumble still plagued him, sticky in the back of his mind.

He keeps his gaze away, on the small tumbling waves of the lake as Charles uses the gauze to wipe away the blood and spilled iodine from Arthur's skin, mindfully cleans the wound with skilled hands. Carefully threads the needle and tilts his head down a bit to try and meet Arthur's eyes, "I'm going to stitch it up now."

Arthur nods, shifts in place a little, turns his torso a bit more toward Charles to give him better access to the wound. The first stitch is always the worst for some reason, Arthur flinching as the needle is hooked underneath his aching skin, "sorry," Charles is murmuring, keeps his hands as gentle as he can as he knits Arthur's skin back together. There's a only a beat of silence between them before Charles is speaking again, voice low and easy, "what was it?"

"What was what?"

He risks a glance, and is given a bland look from Charles in return. Arthur sighs and runs his free hand through his dirty hair, could use a bath soon. "A job." He confesses, no point in trying to hide it really. Feels like Charles could probably tell on his own. Most everyone in the gang knows already, about Arthur's habit of whoring, sans young Jack of course, and Kieran now. New to the gang that he is. No one really bothers him about it none, it's not their place, unless they fancy a good long look in a mirror. Micah of course needles him about it every chance that he can get, Arthur wouldn't expect any less from the slimy bastard. At least he hasn't tried propositioning him yet, Arthur would rather fuck an angry steer.

Miss Grimshaw and Hosea are a bit anal-retentive about it, but not in a horrible or overly obnoxious way though. Grimshaw harps on him to be more selective about the johns that he picks, tells him that if he's going to sleep around for money, that it should at least be with the richest people he could possible find. Hosea simply wants him to be safe about the whole thing, given the general treatment of 'business' folk such as himself by society at large. Purely ironic given the kind of life that they all live, but Arthur honestly appreciates the gesture nonetheless. 

Abigail, bless her heart, is always checking up on him.

"Turned sour," he elaborates further, "trick got rough, Nothin' special."

Charles scoffs, ties off the stitches, discards the needle and picks up the roll of gauze. "He stabbed you." He's saying as he unfolds the gauze and begins to wrap it around Arthur's shoulder, carefully nudges at his elbow to get him to life his arm up a bit. Arthur shrugs his other shoulder, looks at his dirty finger nails, "things go bad sometimes. So it goes."

"It ain't right." Charles says lamely, wraps the gauze over itself in neat layers, knots the slack up tight just near Arthur's collarbone. "You shouldn't have to put up with that."

Arthur shakes his head, snorts. "Can't change it," He picks at the sand, fiddles with a piece of a broken shell. It's a soft peachy color, Arthur wonders what it looked like when it was whole. "It's a way to earn good money that doesn't run the risk of gettin' a bullet in my skull." He flicks the piece of shell away, it skitters across the sand and is swallowed up by the waves.

"You sure about that?" Charles asks, stands up and dusts off his pants. Arthur squints up at him, unable to think of a proper response. He looks away; shame creeping up on him again, grabs his discarded shirt and hat, braces a hand on his thigh, slowly rises, wheezes a bit at that telltale pain below his tail bone. Doesn't miss Charles raising a hand to hover near him, out of the corner of his eye; ready to steady him should he need the support. Forcing himself to look the other man in the eye, feels more or less pinned where he stands by the dark brown gaze, Arthur says, "you should get some rest, Charles." And slides past him toward his tent, walks slow to mind his pain, feels Charles' eyes hot and hard on his back. 

The camp is starting to rise as Arthur hobbles into his tent, quiet and muted commotion as folk begin to wake up. He dumps his filthy shirt on top of his clothing chest, hat on his table. Is quick to tug away at the ropes holding his tent open, heavy canvas dropping low around his small living space and shielding him in the dark.

He decides to keep the sleeves of his underwear down around his waist, can't wrangle himself back into them anyway with his now bum shoulder. Squirms out of the rest of his clothing and carefully drops himself down onto his cot, lays himself out on his back with his left arm stiff at his side, yanks a threadbare blanket up and over himself, lets out a shaky breath, utterly exhausted.

Hopefully Dutch and Grimshaw will see the closed canvas and leave him be for a bit. Arthur doesn't think he has it in him to face anyone else just yet.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Pearl is what I called my white Arabian in my own play through of the game, I'm just gonna insert her into all of my fics lol. Still not as long of a chapter as I would've liked but structurally I wouldn't have wanted it to carry on any longer than it did.
> 
> Comments and the like are very much appreciated!
> 
> [tumblr](https://coyotebrush.tumblr.com)


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Update! And a small warning, there are references to dubious under aged sex work in the beginning of this chapter.

Arthur had turned his first trick when he was just a boy; fourteen maybe. The specific details of it are hazy after all these years, but he remembers the important parts at least, the ones that matter to him. After his daddy had died at the end of a rope, before he'd started riding with Dutch and Hosea. Dirty little orphan forced to live on the streets like some kind of rat, picking pockets and nearly begging for scraps. Squirming in his own filth and struggling to simply live; his short life narrowed down to into the simplest of terms, pure survival. Not unlike an animal.

It had been late in the night, hazy heat over the tightly packed town that Arthur was living rough out of, long shadows cast across the red Earth, dark bars pulled over the dusty ground. Arthur had been stalking around the outside of a saloon, hungry and tired, prowling for any vulnerable drunkards. Eyes darting and fingers itching to snatch at anything he could take; inebriated men stumbling from the swinging doors and down off the porch, laughing and slurring their way into the streets. People in such a state were easy to pick, mostly. Ignorant to anything but the whiskey heavy in their bellies. If they caught him in the act, they were usually too drunk to hit him or grab at him before he could spring away.

One of the men, had noticed him however. And instead of shooing him away or cursing him out, he had gestured for Arthur to step closer. After that, was where the memories had gotten fuzzy. Unfocused snapshots like old photographs in the back of his mind. He'd been offered money, and accepted it of course. Hungry, desperate and none the wiser to what that man had _thought_ he was at that time.

He'd laid Arthur on his back, pulled his clothes off; Arthur still and quiet under his hands, face hot and unsure. There was a mouth on his thighs and stomach, it felt weird and made Arthur's guts twist up in a way he hadn't felt before. He didn't know how he'd felt exactly, but the promise of getting money sang so charmingly to him that he was willing to remain even-tempered under the man's strange yet reverential touch. 

Arthur can't say what had happened after that; only truly remembers the way that the man had touched him. Soft; like he mattered. Was something worthy of being treated in such a way; filled his heart with a desperate and cozy feeling that he's been craving and chasing after he ever since. He'd been given two dollars after that evening; he could buy a warm meal, or a bed for the night, or even a new jacket.

It had been so damn easy; Arthur hadn't even needed to do anything but be compliant, and yet he'd walked away with almost more money than he'd known what to do with. 

He'd continued on with the whores work after that night, even after he had been picked up by Dutch. They'd fed him and taken care of him; and yet, when given the opportunity to slip away from whatever meager camp they'd set up, Arthur had often found himself in bed with other nameless men, knees to his ears, or face pressed into a pillow. He would walk back into camp with his soul in a honey smooth bliss, maybe a limp depending, dollars burning a nice little hole in his pocket. Dutch and Hosea were always curious, but pleased and proud at the money he'd bring in, comforting hands placed on his neck and shoulders. They didn't always ask, but when they did, Arthur'd tell them that he'd simply been out robbing.

It wasn't necessarily a lie, he was still a thief, and a damn good one too. Enjoyed robbing those who deserved it, especially when all of three of them would go out and steal together. But yet he couldn't seem to wean away from selling himself, not that he really fancied stopping the habit anyhow.

They'd found out, eventually. When Arthur was nineteen, shy of twenty. He'd been sloppy about it, had always tried his best to hide his whoring from the men he'd grown to really care for and look up to. Arthur was terrified of how they might react; could imagine the disdain. He felt that they would likely lose any respect they'd had for him, maybe even kick him out of their little gang. What he would do if that happened, he doesn't know. The two of them had become home to him, and the thought of losing that struck hard at his heart. Spiked his anxiety high beyond any level of comfort.

He'd been drunk, hazy, staggering his way through a job. Less careful and particular than usual; they'd been in a bar. Dutch and Hosea hunkered down at a table in the corner, talking low to one another and planning a small robbery on some rich fellar that lived on the outskirts of the town they were passing through. Arthur had been relatively bored of the dull talk, had left the two of them to figure it out amongst themselves and moseyed over to the bar counter. Starting throwing back drinks, heavy ones, and ended up supping one too many. It hadn't been long before Arthur was half gone, seeing snakes, his body mostly slouched over the counter, grinning stupidly to himself. Without thinking too hard about it all, he'd began asking other patrons if they were interested in a poke, for a good price of course. 

Mostly they'd turned him down or shoved him away, the seventh or so man finally shrugging, mildly interested, drinking down the rest of his whiskey and hauling out of his seat. He'd put an arm over Arthur's shoulder, fingers curled into the fabric of his jacket, and made to lead him out of the door of the bar. Arthur himself, was completely addled. Barely standing and content to be dragged along by the stranger, head full and foggy with heavy liquor, warm with the promise of a decent fuck and some money to boot.

"Arthur?"

A voice is then snapping some awareness through that fog, and it has Arthur stumbling over his feet, lands on his knees in the mud. Takes everything he has not to look over his shoulder, at Dutch, who he _knows_ must be standing behind him. Through the heavy daze of drunkenness, mortification begins to roll in like an angry storm cloud. He shrinks down a bit into the mud, cold and wet through his pants.

"Clear off, I got him first." The man is slurring, steps away from Arthur, presumably toward Dutch. A hand touches Arthur's shoulder with gentle fingers; jumping, he pulls away quickly and looks up. Blinks through hazy wide eyes up at Hosea, who wordlessly pulls him up and off of the slick ground, places one hand on his shoulder and the other on the small of his back to steady him.

"I don't think so," He hears Dutch say, liquid drawl of his voice clear through the air "he's drunk, and my responsibility. So I suggest that _you_ clear off."

There's a scoff from the man, but it's followed by the sound of angry muttering and uneven footsteps, fading off down the street. At least no one had to get shot over this. And Arthur is frozen, unable to move despite Hosea trying to gently prod him froward, body rooted to the spot. He flinches when Dutch appears on his other side, clapping a hand hard on his shoulder.

"Come on," he's saying, softly pushes Arthur to start walking toward where their horses are hitched, leaves Hosea to lead him the rest of the way. "You need to sleep this off."

They shove him up onto Hosea's saddle; he's sat in a slouch behind the older man with his arms wrapped loose around his waist, Boadicea following after them as they ride out of the filthy little town and off toward the relative seclusion of their camp. 

It's a dreadfully silent ride, and Arthur could only press his forehead to the back of Hosea's shoulder as they go, unable to tell whether the nauseous feeling that's beginning to boil in belly is from the rocking of the horse, or the humiliation at being caught. Likely both. 

"Think he knew what was going on?" He hears Hosea ask quietly, muted through his cotton stuffed brain but he can still hear it nonetheless. Feels the hum of it through his back, it makes him bury his head further against his shoulder.

"I don't know," Dutch answers, waits a beat before saying, "It's not our business, who he sleeps with."

"Of course not; but it is when he's too inebriated to know what's going on."

Dutch chuckles a little sardonically at that, "well that goes without saying, obviously. But you know what they say, Hosea, ' _Young cowboys had a great fear_ -'"

"Don't finish that sentence for God's sake."

The rest of the ride had been nothing but a blur, Arthur didn't remember being hauled off of Hosea's horse, nor did he remember being laid down on his bed roll. But it evidently happened, as he eventually wakes up face down on the old padded roll, still dressed in his muddy clothes although his boots have been pulled off, ice pick headache pounding mercilessly at his temples. The entire night prior being nothing more than a drunken haze in his mind. 

Arthur groans, whines, practically crawls out of the thing in search of water. Dutch and Hosea are both sat around a low burning fire; it's morning. Maybe around 10 A.M. or so, soft yellow light filtering in through the trees, split up into thin rays that dapple the forest floor. They both look over at him, and he stops in his weak crawl, buries his face into his arms.

"Sorry.."

Dutch is barking out a laugh, stands up out of his chair and moves to crouch at Arthur's side, helps drag him up and over to the fire. "The first of many experiences I'm sure." He says in a wry voice, handing Arthur a tin flask.

He takes a little sniff of the liquid inside, wrinkling his nose at the smell of brandy that wafts up. Stings his nostrils. He takes a swig despite that, stomach absolutely roiling at the action. Hair of the dog that bit you and all that. Hosea is quick to take the flask away from him, dumps it out and gives Dutch a pointed look. Passes Arthur a canteen that's thankfully full of fresh water; he sloppily downs it within a matter of seconds.

"Want to tell us about last night?" Hosea asks, leans on a knee and fixes Arthur with his calm gaze.

"What?" Arthur asks, wiping water from his chin before he freezes when the memories start to rise up, ugly and unwelcome, his skin prickling.

"Nothin'. It was nothin'."

"Nothing?" Dutch is repeating, incredulity lining his voice. Brown eyes fixed stern on Arthur.

"Nothin'." Arthur reiterates, sets the now empty canteen aside. "Ain't your business how I make my money anyhow," he mutters lowly.

It was the wrong choice of words, he'd been notably unaware that the two of them hadn't been privy of the particulars regarding last night's encounter at the bar. There's a pregnant pause that swells in the air, Arthur's words hanging heavy.

"Money?" Dutch and Hosea both parrot back at him, it would have been funny if not for the context.

"No." Arthur snarls instantly, voice cracking with it. He stands up quickly and sways in place, takes a moment to press a hand hard against his angry stomach, throat going wet and thick. Thankfully, he doesn't vomit. And after a moment of regaining his bearings, he swivels on his heels and makes to stalk away, but is stopped when Dutch, never knowing when to shut his mouth, is speaking again.

"Was that man going to pay you for sex?"

" _No_!"

"Arthur," Hosea says, voice ever so level and patient; more so than Arthur feels he deserves in this moment. It sends heat to rise under his skin, he focuses hard on the ground, bites his quivering lip. 

"Calm down, we're just asking."

"I don't care," Arthur is spitting, looks around wildly and spots where Boadicea is hitched to a nearby tree. He's tripping over himself in his rush to get to her, grabs the horn of her saddle and hauls himself up and onto her back. Dutch is barking after him, but Arthur ignores his call. Yips at Bo and kicks at her flanks to get her going. She snorts loudly, pulls back and then halts, throws her head back with an upset nicker. In his frantic haste, Arthur had neglected to untie her lead. Letting out a frustrated cry, Arthur leans around her broad neck to undo the knot with shaky fingers, is stopped when a hand wraps around his skinny wrist.

"Let me go," he says, unable to look Dutch the eye. Tries to tug his wrist out from Dutch's tight grip.

"No," Dutch says simply, "you don't need to go running off, Arthur. We just want you to be honest with us, that's all."

Arthur yanks away again, face twisting up into a grimace. Dutch lets go of his arm, slow and careful. But instead places his hand where Boadicea's lead is tied, preventing Arthur from undoing the knot. Hosea is standing a few cautionary paces away, expression decidedly somber. 

"Listen, Arthur. What you decide to do with yourself and your time, is up to you. You're an adult and that's your prerogative." Dutch is saying in a low voice, he removes his hand from Bo's lead and steps back, hands up and open. Arthur risks a glance up at the two men, sees the looks on their faces and immediately averts his gaze, looks down at his fingers gripped tightly around the horn of his saddle. He turns away, eyes to the ground; he wants to crawl back into his bed roll and sleep, hide away from everything. 

"Arthur," Dutch continues, gestures to both himself and Hosea, "we'd be hypocrites to judge you for the choices you make. That's not what we're about."

There's a silence that sits heavy in the air, Arthur keeps his gaze firm on the ground for a moment before forcing himself to look over at Dutch and Hosea, to meet the humane gaze that they both share. Eyes stinging with unshed tears; he squeezes them shut and lets out a deep breath. Blinks rapidly. Anxiety, fear and many other emotions coursing thick and rich through his veins.

"We're free out here," Dutch is saying, "and as long as what you're doing ain't harming anyone who doesn't deserve it, you'll get no temper from us."

Hosea steps around Dutch then, takes heedful paces forward and pats a hand over Arthur's knee. "Just be careful about it, is all." He tells him with a gentle little smile, moves his hand to rest on Bo's flank. "Don't go off with someone when you're too drunk to even piss straight."

That earns a dry laugh from Arthur, little more than a loose huff but it beats a bit of mirth out of him nonetheless. He lifts a hand to rub furiously at his face; still feeling put out and dazey, shame fresh underneath his skin. Prickling awkwardness creeping up his spine and settling over his shoulders.

"Alright, now hop on off that horse," Dutch says, claps his hands together and struts back on toward the campfire. "We've got a robbery to discuss."

\----

The following day sees Arthur begrudgingly working despite his aching shoulder; he's managed to grab a few fitful hours of sleep before Miss Grimshaw is tugging open the canvas of his tent, shoving it to the side and letting in a flood of near blinding light. It wakes him with a quick jerk, before he's groaning loudly, squeezing his eyes shut tighter and turning his head away.

"Arthur!" She snips, "you can't sleep all.." She cuts herself off, seeming to notice the bruises marring his face as well as the bandages wrapped tight over his shoulder, "-day."

He sits up, groans. There's pain everywhere; notably in his shoulder of course, his jaw, his rear. Head throbbing a bit with a fresh headache. Evidence of last night refusing to hide away.

"What happened?" She asks, and he squints up at her, nothing more than a darkened silhouette with the afternoon light flowing in around her.

"Just a bit of trouble," Arthur answers, voice gritty from sleep, swings his legs off from his cot. Lifts a hand to pinch at the bridge of his nose. He feels horrible, would love to sleep for several more hours, the whole day maybe. But it's simply not feasible, there's too much work to be done. He sighs, stretches as much as he can with the hurt that lances through his body. "Nothin' to worry about," he says on an exhale, "I'll be up and out in a moment."

Miss Grimshaw nods, steps back and releases the canvas, darkening his small living space once more "alright, Arthur. Thank you." He can't tell if her voice is soft because of sympathy, or if it's just being muffled by the tent flap.

He waits until her footsteps quieten off, sags back into the cot below him. Swipes a hand through his hair; dirty, sweaty, a little too long. He can't bring himself to care too much, stands with a drawn out groan, stretches a bit once more. Shuffles over to his clothing chest and pulls out a fresh pair of underwear, old saddle pants and a simple button up shirt. Changing is a bit of a nightmare, every slight movement sending hot flares of pain through the wound on his shoulder, his aching thighs and ass. Head near throbbing by the time he's carefully plugging the buttons of his shirt, slower than usual on account of his shoulder, hands shaking just a bit. He pushes the canvas aside, steps out and into the daylight.

Arthur squints at the assault of light that hits him, turns his head away against it. 

"Arthur," Hosea greets from where he's sitting at their main table, sat comfortably in a chair with a book in his hands. Arthur offers him a small smile, wanders over and leans against the thing, mindful of his sore backside. "Mornin' Hosea" he says, looks around the camp. It's empty for the most part, seems most of the boys are out, even Dutch. Likely enjoying libation with the Grays, wrapping that dumb little sheriff cleanly around his finger.

"How are you?" Hosea is asking, pushes a half filled cup of coffee across the wooden table. Arthur takes it, finishes it off, even the bitter dregs. The harshness of the caffeine is a welcome taste along his tongue; he places the now empty cup on the table and fixes his gaze on Hosea. "I'm survivin'" He answers lamely, pushes off and steps away before Hosea can ask any more questions, notice and drill him about the obvious injuries.

"That bad, then."

"Yep." Is Arthur's simple reply, he moves over toward the side of John and Abigail's tent, where the hay bales are laid outside of. He bends over and hooks his fingers underneath the twine that holds the bales together, shifts the weight of it to his aching thighs, stands and straightens his back with a suppressed groan, shoulder throbs with the motion of it all.

He moves to take the hay over to the nearest cluster of horses, and is stopped on his way by another greeting, Mary-Beth looking up from her book and offering him a kind smile. Dressed impeccably as usual, hair curled tight and crisp.

"Hi Arthur," she says cheerfully. Tilly is there as well, dainty chin balanced in her hand as she gazes off toward the distance, seeming to have been lost in a daydream. Mary-Beth's voice pulls her out from it, and she's looking up to Arthur as well, smiling happily in turn.

"Hey girls," Arthur tells them, gives them the best grin that he can muster despite himself.

"Sit with us a minute?" Mary-Beth asks, dog earing her book and setting it aside. "Grimshaw's off our tails for the time bein', and you look like you could use some company."

Arthur hesitates, but steps over toward them and places the hale bay down anyway, carefully eases himself down to sit on it. Grimaces slightly, but is quick to hide it before the girls can notice. It was only a flicker, but by the soft looks that pass over Tilly and Mary-Beth's faces, they could clearly tell that something was up regardless. He's getting sloppy.

"How's it goin'?" Tilly asks, tilts her head at him.

"Ah, I don't know." Arthur admits, shrugs a little but regrets it at the lick of pain it sends through his stab wound. "Rough, I guess."

"Ain't that just how it goes," Mary-Beth sighs, leans over and pats Arthur's hand where it's placed over his knee. "You wanna talk about it?"

"Not uh, particularly." Arthur says awkwardly, looks away. Can see little Jack playing over by the shore, Abigail sat on a log nearby, dutifully watching him as he splashes about in the shallow waters. Of everyone in the camp, he's typically more willing to talk to the girls about his 'work'. They understand it more than anyone, but he's not particularly desiring to discuss anything at the moment, despite the emotions whirling through him. Confusion, pain, exhaustion, frustration, longing. A wretched cocktail.

Tilly shrugs, gives him that endlessly kind-hearted look that she's perfected so well, nearly sharpened into a tool. "That's fine, Arthur." She placates, "but we're always willing to listen if you want to talk; about anything."

It earns a small grin, Arthur looking sheepishly downward, cheeks pinking a bit. He scratches at the back of his neck, "I know," he says. "It's just, hard to talk about.. certain things sometimes." He looks up and is met with two sets of open, mellow eyes. It eases him, just a bit. And he's looking around the camp to make sure that no one is too close by before leaning in, speaking lowly. "Trick went bad last night." He explains, unease spreading through him as he thinks about the john's rough hands, the knife. His words.

He's given concerned frowns in exchange, Tilly asking, "how bad?"

"Coulda been worse but, he pulled a knife on me."

"Really?" Mary-Beth exclaims, her brows narrow down a bit. "Tell me it ended with him in worse shape than you."

Arthur huffs, threads his fingers together, looks down at them. A small and immature feeling of smugness worming it's way into his voice when he says, "'course it did. Knocked him out 'n robbed him for everything he had, at least on his person. Left the fool with his pants around his ankles."

"Good," Tilly remarks, examines her neatly trimmed nails. "Deserved it I'm sure."

He opens his mouth to speak again, corner of it quirking up, his chest already feeling lighter, more airy. Arthur isn't entirely fond of the vulnerability caused by spilling his guts like this, but he can't deny that it loosens up something within him. He holds his tongue when he hears footsteps tromping by, glances up and immediately frowns when he makes eye contact with Micah.

The other man is doing nothing but walking by, sauntering like he's something special of course. Micah looks over to the girls before locking eyes with Arthur again, grinning sloppily before slickly addressing, "ladies." Gives a poor imitation of a bow before continuing his catty strut across camp, toward his horse. Arthur says nothing, watches hard and mean at his back, doesn't break his gaze until Micah has rode off through the trees, hopefully to be gone for a while. Days if they're lucky; killed if they're even luckier. He looks back at Mary-Beth when she scoffs. "I really do hate that man."

"You and me both." Tilly agrees.

Taking it as a cue, Arthur braces his hands against his knees and stands slowly, exhales at the strain before threading his fingers under the bale twine again and lifting the heavy thing up.

"I'll talk to you later, girls." He says, straightens his shoulders and moves to deposit the hay before the horses so they can feed. After he dumps it to the ground, pulls his knife out from it's sheath to cut the twine, Hosea is coming up to him, book tucked under his arm. 

"Arthur," he says, voice pragmatic. "I'm heading off to 'mingle' with that Braithwaite family, and it would be in your best interest to head off to Caliga Hall before Dutch escorts you out there himself."

Arthur doesn't hide his sigh, turns away from Hosea to pet at Old Bell's long face, she pushes her soft nose against his fingers. He's not really a fan of this plan, inserting themselves into this apparent endless feud between old Antebellum families, but it's not really his place to dispute such matters. He's the work horse, he does as he's told. Even if it meant sucking up to some Dixie-whistlers and playing a cute idea of a law man. "Alright," he grouses, braces a hand against his lower back. "Just gimme a minute."

Hosea's mouth curls, he places a hand on his hip and gives Arthur a quick once over. "I know that you were 'out' last night. Charles told me."

"What?" Arthur barks, looks around before lowering his voice and stepping closer, face hot. "Why?"

"Because I asked him." Hosea answers tersely, "so don't take it out on him."

As if he would do that; Charles' earnest nature was truly something to be admired, just another trait that Arthur valued in him. He doesn't imagine that Charles would have divulged the information of last night's escapades to anyone else, if they'd asked. Even Dutch. He seemed to be able to clearly read the particular brand of loyalty between Arthur and Hosea, and decided that Arthur's interesting case of a job was worth mentioning to him. Since Hosea seemed to have an idea of it anyway, clearing the air regarding it must have been an easy and simple choice for the man to make. Arthur doesn't blame Charles for it, but it doesn't do anything to help how plain embarrassed he is by the whole thing. Especially when confronted with it by Hosea now.

"Okay," Arthur says evenly. "And what of it? It's done, I got something good out it."

Hosea makes a loose gesture at Arthur, his expression tight. "Charles told me that you got stabbed. Over _sex_?"

"Yes, shit happens" Arthur says in a bitter voice, after a stubborn moment of silence. Pushes away from the hitches and heads toward the store of hay bales once again; Hosea stepping in line behind him. 

"It'd do you well to be less blasé about these things, Arthur." He admonishes, "is that the attitude you want to have when there's a rope around your neck?"

Arthur spins around and tries to pin Hosea with a hard glare, but instantly withers under the even harder look that Hosea is throwing his way. He knows that Hosea is just concerned about him, but he doesn't have much reason to be. He's still alive and breathing, that's all that should really matter. Anything in between, even getting stabbed over sex of all things, is trivial as long as Arthur is still standing and able to provide for his family. It's not Hosea's business.

"Of course not," he says, sighs, looks for the right thing to say. "I just- it's what I do Hosea, you know that."

Hosea stares at him for an unbearably long moment, something sharp flashing in his eyes. Finally, he breaks away with a heavy sigh, tosses his book to a nearby barrel and turns his back to Arthur, starts to walk over toward his horse. "If you ask me," he says, sounding more than a little fatigued as he unhitches Silver Dollar, mounts up onto the sleek gray animal's back, grunting at the exertion. "This 'thing' that you do has become a little more self destructive than justifiable."

With that, Hosea spurs off and out of camp, leaving Arthur to stew pitifully over his words, as well as the heavy indignity that had long since settled over him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Writing this chapter was kind of difficult, because I wanted to convey that Arthur wasn't afraid of Dutch and Hosea finding out that he slept with men as much as he was afraid of them finding out that he was doing sex work. Both of these were very common back in the Old West, but in terms of what you'd be more judged for, it'd likely be being "used as a woman" during paid sex while being a man than just than having sex with other men. This isn't to say that Arthur, Dutch, and Hosea had misogynistic views as such (evidenced in the game, they were very open minded) but because women had such little social standing at the time, anything that'd compared you to a woman (or what was expected of one) was likely to earn you harsh treatment from other men, it's rational that Arthur would be afraid of how he'd be treated in such circumstances, especially in the earlier years of the gang when they were still getting to know each other. 
> 
> Gay sex could still get you treated poorly back then, just not nearly as much in the western part of the states. I'd love to elaborate but the notes of a fic is really not the place lol. Also, the phrase that Dutch begins to say is a real limerick from the Old West, it goes "Young cowboys had a great fear, That old studs once filled with beer, Completely addle', They'd throw on the saddle, And ride them on the rear,"
> 
> Comments and the like are very much appreciated!
> 
> [tumblr](https://coyotebrush.tumblr.com)


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry that this took so long! Life is coming at me fast so I haven't had much free time to write. Personally I feel like this chapter is a bit of a mess but I also really like it so ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯

He's going to die, Arthur is sure of it. There's a noose of fire around his neck, burning and ripping at the skin of his throat, squeezing every bit of breath out from his lungs. He's scrabbling at the fastened coil of rope, desperately trying to worm his fingers between the rough cord and his aching neck, squirming and kicking out in wild distress, heels striking hard against the tilled Earth beneath him. The bounty hunter at his back keeps his grip tight and mean; Arthur can feel the man's breath hot on the back of his head, through his hair and on his scalp.

A screen of spotty black is pulled over Arthur's eyes, he blinks rapidly but his vision doesn't clear, tears prickle and fall quick over his cheekbones, down overheated skin. There's a horrible noise; muffled like it's hidden underneath a layer of cotton, roiling and ugly. Beneath the screaming haze of pressurized misery filling his head, Arthur realizes that the retching is coming from himself, wrung out from his mouth by the rope that strangles him.

Arthur isn't unfamiliar with the concept of his own fragile mortality; his impending death is always a lingering thought in his mind. More than once, he had found himself chest-deep in situations where he'd been forced to consider the outcome of not making it out alive. Breathless on the back of a horse with bullets cutting fast and sharp through the air past his ears, over his shoulders and sides. Crouched tight and close behind meager cover with a spray of gunfire hurled in his direction, heart in his throat. Stared straight down a shiny barrel more than once, cross-eyed as he'd veritably kissed the mouth of many a gun. The thought, 'I _could_ die here' was a frequent one, but never before had the thought 'I'm _going_ to die here' spawn in his mind. He'd stood on Death's door plenty of times, but it wasn't until today that that door had been opened, giving him a look inside.

And what he saw terrified him.

He writhes, jerks in place, tries to twist his spine and gain any leverage possible but the bounty hunter has the upper hand, uses it to keep Arthur pinned under his forceful restraint. The man is laughing, dumb pleased like a cat that's caught a mouse. He feels something go _pop_ up between his eyes, in his nose, and a hot rush of blood gushes down over his mouth and chin. Past the blurry film of tears over Arthur's eyes, a shape rips out from the rows of corn that wall around them. Quick; fuzzy like a shadow, and Arthur doesn't have time to gauge, trapped in his panic, when the pressure around his throat is suddenly released and he's dropping backward into the dirt. Dazed and seeing stars, chest expanding as oxygen floods down his throat like water from a burst damn. He curls over onto his side, reaches a shaking hand to the inflamed skin of his neck, gasping and spitting.

Propping himself up onto an elbow, Arthur glances at the slumped over body of the bounty hunter, throwing knife lodged finely between the ribs that bracket his heart, his chest black with freshly spilled blood. He's spitting up foamy bile and squinting over at his savior; Charles, who's striding down the row and crouching in front of him.

"You alright?" He asks, intense gaze firm on the raw skin of Arthur's neck. Wordlessly he reaches over and yanks the slackened rope off from where it's draped limply over Arthur's shoulders, tosses it roughly away into the stalks.

"Just about," Arthur wheezes, wipes blood and spit away from his chin, his voice dry and gravely as if it's been pulled through glass. He braces a hand against his shuddering chest, heart going wild like a crazed rabbit.

Charles nods, lips pursed and eyes doleful. He tilts his head, makes to speak, but is interrupted when a bullet bites hard into the ground mere feet from where they're crouched, a spray of red dirt is spat up from where it had struck. Arthur scrambles to get his feet under him, reaches for his gun from where'd he dropped it in the wake up being jumped, but freezes when Charles says, "no."

Arthur looks up at him, breath still coming out hot and heavy through his nose, world tipping around him. Charles brushes past him, places a quick hand over Arthur's shoulder, palm heavy and firm. "I'll take care of it," he says, edge to his voice. Thunders down through the corn stalks toward the barn, where the other remaining bounty hunter is hunkered down and throwing slugs. He pulls his shotgun from its holster and makes quick work of weaving toward the old wooden structure, bullets nipping angry at him as the bounty hunter frantically tries to cut him down. Arthur watches him for only a moment before hauling himself up, vision going black at the sudden change. He squeezes his eyes shut and waits for it to pass, stumbles through the dry fields and toward the small shack where'd they'd left Trelawny in waiting.

The other man is definitely worse for wear, face shiny and swollen with bruising, but he's alive. And as he's halfway through lamely explaining to Arthur who exactly these bounty hunters were, Charles is jogging back over from the barn, not a scratch on him. The sight releases a coil of tension in Arthur's chest that he hadn't been aware of. He looks away and reaches for his throbbing throat as Charles moves around him to help Trelawny stand up, mindful of his newly acquired injuries. 

"Can't go back to that caravan now," Trelawny says sardonically once he's seated on the back of the red nag that had been hitched outside of the shack, likely belonging to one of the bounty hunters they'd disposed of. Swaying in the saddle, composure broken from the beating he'd received. Arthur had never seen the other man in such a way before.

"Coming back with us?" Charles is asking as he settles himself onto Taima's back.

Arthur wants to say no, wants to go find some quiet corner of turf where he can lick his wounds, but the thought evaporates when he meets Charles eyes. Firm, expectant. He practically shrivels under the rich gaze and wraps a hand around his saddle horn, hauls himself up and onto the thing with a grunt.

"Yeah," he sighs, face warm. "I'll ride with ya."

It's a relatively short trip back into Clement's Point, Trelawny uncharacteristically but justifiably silent for the duration of it. Arthur keeps an eye on him as they ride.

Arthur ponders whether or not he should split off before they get too close to camp, would much rather avoid Grimshaw and Dutch's fussing and questioning about what had just happened, even if it was only for a few hours. He feels very lightheaded, and there's a sharp pain wrapped in a tight ring around his neck. Clears his throat and winces as the action sends a hot burst down to his collarbones. All of the aches and pains, sans the stab wound, from his recent trick had just faded away, only now to be replaced by his neck being more or less ravaged by some sadistic bounty hunter. Just what he needed. 

He hasn't worked any jobs since that night, just a little over a week ago. And he's started to get that itch again, the one that claws at him and leaves him with nothing but wanting. Shaking his shoulders out, Arthur pulls on Pearl's reins to slow her down once they start to thread down the trail that leads into camp. 

"Hey," A rough voice is saying as they approach, John peeling himself away from the tree he'd been leaning on, rifle steady in his hands. He glances from Charles to Trelawny, face screwing up in mild confusion. "What'd I miss?" He asks, steps forward a bit to get a better look at Trelawny's battered face. 

"Nothing you need to concern yourself with, dear boy." Trelawny says in a rather fatigued voice, waves him away. "Just business as usual."

"Right," John says in a light grouse, steps off the trail and leans against the tree once more, watches as they pass by him toward camp. As Arthur rides past, they make eye contact. John's eyes are notably curious, but Arthur merely shrugs at him, entirely not in the mood to explain their recent little adventure. Doesn't think he could properly speak at the moment anyhow, he can practically feel his throat swelling up by the second.

Sure enough, Dutch is there to meet them. Stood next to Hosea at one of their tables, hands on his hips as they speak to one another. Likely scheming further into the insufferable feud between the Grays and Braithwaites. Luckily for Arthur, Dutch's attention narrows down onto Trelawny as they pull their horses to a stop at the hitches. 

"Well, Josiah!" Dutch is braying as he strides over, leans in to appraise Trelawny's fresh injuries. "Looks like someone got into some trouble."

Arthur takes the opportunity to excuse himself, instead opts to swing Pearl around and makes to head out toward the trail again. He's halted when Charles is there, quiet as ever, hand on the white horses's neck. "Wait for me." He murmurs, and Arthur can do nothing but freeze for a second, stare dumbly down at Charles before answering, "okay." Voice hushed, he's barely sure that Charles had heard it, but the other man is stepping away and moving toward his tent, leaving Arthur to sit and stew for a moment.

He isn't sure how Charles always seems to pick up on certain ticks or nuances, but Arthur figures it's just one of those things. Charles is not social, or particularly friendly, but what he seems to lack in sociability he more than makes up for with his ability to understand people, to read them and learn their patterns. It's something that Arthur doesn't quite understand, and in moments like this, where he finds himself at the center of Charles' eagle-like focus, that Arthur can't help but feel self conscious. Fumbling and stupid. Is reminded of all the things that he can't seem to do as well as the others. That, layered on top of the past shame of bluntly asking Charles if he had wanted to fuck, should by all means be sending Arthur for the hills, and yet he still finds himself enjoying Charles' company. He'd be lying to himself if he tried to deny that some part of him, small and buried, didn't light up like the sun when the other man's attention was on him.

Charles returns, stows his bow onto Taima's saddle before mounting up, then looks to Arthur. "Okay, let's go."

They spur off and ride silently, a welcomed silence. Neither man demanding anything from the other. They're halfway toward the dried up bed of Dewberry Creek when Charles finally asks, "are you alright?"

Arthur doesn't answer; at least not right away, looks lazily over Pearl's head as they ride aimlessly toward The Heartlands. He thinks for a moment, decides that he's too tired to try and be anything other than honest, "I don't know." He answers, words feeling thick and heavy on his tongue. Throat rolling in pain; he spits a bloody gob to the ground and looks anywhere but Charles. "It's just one thing after another these days."

Charles doesn't reply, and Arthur doesn't expect him to. It's a near aimless ride over the wide rolling green belt, untouched and wild, verdant green grasses dotted with soft yellow wildflowers. Animals scattering as they cut through. Everything that makes Arthur's heart ache, wish that they could just be back in open country again, not hiding and darting from one slummy hideaway to the next, but he knows that the chances of ever living a life like that again are incredibly slim. In spite of what Dutch might say. 

"Are you okay?" He ends up asking despite himself, manages to look over in Charles' direction. Charles is sat up straight in his saddle, eyes locked forward as they cut across the grass. His dark hair is loose around his shoulders, flickering free in the light breeze.

"As much as I can be," is the stilted answer. And Arthur is oddly amused that the both of them don't seem to be too educated in the fine art of conversation. "Well ain't we a pair," Arthur is replying, mostly to himself. But Charles hears it anyway, and Arthur doesn't see the small, private way that he smiles at that. 

The rest of the ride is quiet, and long. Arthur driving his horse at a steady pace, Charles following behind. It isn't until they've reached the dry, more arid plains of New Hanover that Arthur slows Pearl down, gives her a hefty pat for her trouble. Charles pulls up beside him, wipes sweat from his forehead and looks around. The sky is on fire with the sunset, vermillion bleeding into crimson and purple. 

"I found this tree," Arthur begins to say, gently pushes his horse to move again once she seems to have rested a bit. "And I thought it was pretty," he ducks his head a little sheepishly, spurs Pearl toward a path that winds around a deep sloping hill. "Never got to stop by it, only rode past it."

Charles follows him, wordlessly, and it makes Arthur's heart flutter. He feels a little stupid, getting flustered the way he is, but he couldn't stop it if he tried. Charles isn't questioning him, or trying to force answers or an explanation from him, and it's... nice. It's a kind of attentive patience that Arthur greatly appreciates, and it has him grinning, just a bit, as they crest the hill. The tree that Arthur had been searching for sitting tall and strong up ahead.

It's a large, old thing. Dry, and without much by way of foliage. There's nothing spectacular about the tree, but Arthur was well and truly enthralled by it. It's seemingly the only one out here, in these dry and empty lands, standing out at the peak of a hill, overlooking Flat Iron Lake, like a beacon. Arthur had spotted it a few times from a distance while riding through The Heartlands, it had been far away but it stood so proudly, so tall on the crest of the hill that he couldn't help but notice it. Up close, as he dismounts, Arthur can see that there are several empty bottles hanging from the tree, stacked around it's trunk. Waving gentle and slow in the low breeze, chiming quietly as they brush against one another. Light from the dying sun catches and glitters and glows along the glass. It'd be a lovely thing to sketch.

Arthur turns around as Charles hops off from Taima, takes a breath and looks over at the lake on the horizon, a beautiful wash of warm colors.

"You don't have to stick with me no more," Arthur offers, shrugging a little, "I'm fine."

"I know," Charles says, leaves it at that and walks past Arthur to look up at the tree, reaches a careful hand up to touch one of the bottles and read the sun bleached label.

Arthur barks out a dry chuckle at that, stifles hard it as it agonizes his ruined throat, a deep throb that he can feel to his ears, behind his eyes. Charles turns toward him at that, frowns. "Want me to take a look?" He says, steps away from the tree.

Shrugging again, Arthur moves to sit on one of the rocks that line around the tree, slumps down with a sigh. "Be my guest," he says, voice cracking a bit. "Ain't much you can do."

Charles hums, walks over to Taima and digs around in her saddle bag for a moment, pulls out a small tin before joining Arthur on the rock. "We're startin' to make a habit of this," Arthur snickers, tilts his head back a little when Charles gestured for him to do so, wincing as the motion pulls on his hurts.

"Well," Charles replies, corner of his mouth quirking up just a bit, touches careful fingers to Arthur's neck, the pads of them are cool and feather light on his angry, raw skin. "Stop getting into trouble then."

Arthur simpers; there's a warm and pleasant hum under his skin that he can't ignore, no matter how much he wants to. Internally, chastises himself for it.

"Here," says Charles, he unscrews the lid from the metal tin and sets it aside, there's a glazy, sort of yellow ointment settled inside. He dips two of his fingers into it, then settles back to face Arthur, "hold still."

Carefully, Charles applies the ointment over Arthur's abused skin, gently rubs the salve in with deft hands. "Tilt your head forward," he says, uses one hand to scoop Arthur's hair off of the back of his neck, uses the other to apply more of the soothing medicine. It feels good, weird and kind of slimy, but it almost instantly relieves the burning feeling that had been clinging harshly to his skin. Lays over the pain like a soft blanket, muffling it and hiding it away. The deep, bruising ache is still there but at least the rope burn was somewhat handled. "What is that?" Arthur asks, looks curiously to the tin as Charles screws it shut once more.

"Marigold," Charles explains, "reduces inflammation. It's good for your skin."

"Marigold?" Arthur parrots, "ain't that a flower?"

"It is," Charles says, smirks a bit. He stands up and moves to return the tin to his saddle bag, "a lot of flowers and plants have medicinal properties. You should know that."

"Yeah well," Arthur says with a wry huff, "I ain't exactly known for my brains."

Charles laughs, an airy and genuine sound that makes Arthur's heart flip around his chest like a fish out of water. He turns away from Taima and looks over at the land that stretches wide around them, hand on his hip. "No, you're known for other things."

Arthur pulls his journal from his satchel then, digs his pencil out too. Settles himself back into a more comfortable position, opens the journal and lays it out flat over his lap, flips to an open page. "And what would those other things be, then?" He asks, takes in the sight before him and begins to sketch, quick and careful lines. Charles tilts his head, watches close as Arthur carefully etches lines onto the paper, a quick and steady study of the tree that overlooks them. He walks back over to the rock and sits down next to Arthur once more, keeps a foot or so of space between them as not to disturb his work. 

"Well you're definitely not known for being a draftsman." Charles comments, watching Arthur draw with an acute fascination. "Is this what you do? When you leave camp for days on end?"

"More or less," Arthur answers, his eyes down and firm on the paper. He then adds, quieter "among other things."

It sours the air, just a bit. Arthur continuing his sketch, immediately regretting that he'd even said anything, lets out a bitter sigh. Absolutely refuses to look up at Charles.

Charles is silent for a moment, exhales carefully through his nose. Leans back a bit and looks up at the darkening sky, "how's the shoulder?" He asks, rolls his neck to pin Arthur with that gaze of his.

Arthur's hand stills, pencil frozen mid line. He chews his lip for a moment before sighing heavily, closes the journal and sets it aside. "Y'know Charles," he starts, "I don't do whore's work because I like getting thrown around."

"Of course not."

"I do it because it because it gets us money."

"I'm not denying that." Charles says, hauls himself up and off the rock, sidles over to Taima to dig through the saddlebag again.

"Then why are you grillin' me?" 

"Because I don't believe you."

The words cut like a knife, and they freeze Arthur's breath in his lungs. He gapes openly at Charles, searches for the right thing to say. Charles doesn't elaborate further, steps away from his horse with a bottle of alcohol in hand, flicks the cap off and takes a deep pull from the drink, eyes firm on Arthur. Still floundering for a response, Arthur opts to stand up, setting his journal aside, moves and takes the offered bottle from Charles to take his own swig. He grimaces at the choking taste of bourbon; it burns his battered throat something fierce, nearly has him spitting up the stuff. He wipes his chin and lets out a ragged exhale. 

"What is it that you don't believe?" He asks, handing the bottle back to Charles and wandering over to Pearl, removes his usual camping supplies from his saddle, slings his bed roll over his shoulder.

Charles takes another heavy drink, leans with his back against the tree, cool and calm. Points lamely in Arthur's direction as he dumps his bed roll down next to his journal, then starts to dig around in his satchel for tools to build a fire. "I don't believe that you do whore's work just for the money."

The earns a laugh, a rather incredulous one. Arthur shakes his head as he crouches near the remnants of an older fire, near the base of the tree. He stuffs small twigs and bits of dried plants underneath the half charred logs; lights a match and shoves it in as well, leans in to blow carefully at the fresh little flame. "That's an interestin' theory, Charles." Arthur remarks, pulling away from the small fire to look over at the other man. "Got any evidence to back it up?"

"Maybe." Is Charles' curt answer, he hands the bottle back over to Arthur, who gladly takes it and drinks down a hard swig. Arthur then sits back onto the dirt with his arms slung over his knees, tilts his head back as much as he can without aggravating his rope burn. Tries hard to ignore the way that his skin is prickling, defensive insecurity worming it's way to the surface. Urging him to deflect until the situation goes away, until it can be forgotten about and put to the side. However, something tells him that Charles won't let this go; it's not as though Charles spends his every waking moment letting Arthur's know of his 'dissatisfaction' with Arthur's particular brand of money making, but he always seems to gently remind Arthur of his concerns whenever Arthur is feeling particularly low.

The concern is well placed, and it makes Arthur's heart feel warm, but it also sends a hot spike through his chest. One that tells him to run and hide, to bury himself deep and safe where no one can find him. 

"I'd have to _investigate_ more, but I think I'm on to something." Charles is saying, steps wide around Arthur and sits near him. He sits with one leg cocked up, elbow hooked over his knee, the other leg against the ground with his weight leaned onto his other arm. Dark hair spilling over his shoulder, low light of the fire sending a bright shine to ripple along the strands. Arthur has to look away, clears his throat again. Regrets it, as it hurts of course.

"Let me know if you learn anything more, then." Arthur fumbles, scratches at his growing beard. He could do with a shave. "I'm curious."

"I'm sure you are," Charles teases, takes one more drink from the bourbon before handing the bottle to Arthur, who takes the last swig. He tilts the bottle until the remaining vestiges of the booze drip out and onto the dirt, looks lazily over at Charles.

"You got any twine?"

Charles shrugs, leans back on his palms. "You're the one who's out here all the time, shouldn't you have some?"

Arthur lowers the bottle and gives Charles a faux pointed look, carefully sets it aside to dig around in his overstuffed satchel. "You're probably right," he mumbles, starts to feel the warm buzz of the alcohol shiver through his limbs. "You usually are."

Charles hums, looks at Arthur with soft eyes as he pulls an old spool of fishing line out from his satchel, holds up and waggles it at Charles with a dumb little smirk. 

"Congratulations." Charles says, tilts his head back and watches as Arthur stands up on somewhat shaky legs, pulls his hunting knife from it's sheath to cut a line from the spool.

"Hang on," Arthur says. "I got this."

He ties one end of the line into a clumsy knot around the neck of the bottle, tests it by dangling it a bit. Satisfied by the fact that his knot held and that the bottle did not fall to the ground, Arthur swivels on his heels to face the tree; he looks over at the branches that are within a reachable distance, and decides on one that only has a few bottles hanging from it. He has to stand up on his tip-toes in order to wrap the line around the branch, but once that's done he double knots the slack and gives it a nice little tug. Taps the bottle and watches it spin around as he steps away to admire his handiwork.

"There," he says, gestures toward the tree. "Now we've been here."

"Now we've been here," Charles agrees, unable to hide the grin that settles over his face. He gestures for Arthur to sit back down once more, pats the ground beside him.

Arthur moves to return to Charles' side, but not before stepping over to where Pearl is hitched and removing a bottle of alcohol from his own saddlebag. Sits down roughly and hands Charles' the bottle, grinning sloppily as he does so.

"What is it?" Charles asks, turning the unlabeled bottle over in his hands, cloudy liquid sloshing inside.

"That there is genuine Dixie whistlin' tonsil paint." Arthur says, finding crooked amusement at the face that Charles' makes when he unscrews the cap and gives the liquid a curious sniff.

"Geez," Charles practically spits, holds the bottle out for Arthur to take, "moonshine? You always struck me as a whiskey man."

"A gut warmer's a gut warmer," Arthur says, takes the bottle from Charles and drinks down a heavy pull. It's horrible, burns worse than the bourbon, but Arthur shakes it off and hands the bottle to Charles, who carefully takes his own drink, to a similar reaction. He's exhaling roughly and giving his head a rough shake, dark hair whipping with the motion.

"Strong stuff," Charles manages to say, coughs a bit and hands it back to Arthur. 

They don't drink much more after that; deciding that it's not really the best time to be carrying a load. And settle for the comfortable haziness of a very good buzz. Warm and familiar, thick enough to buff Arthur's muddled thoughts away, for the time being at least. He didn't want to think about anything, at all. Other than simply sitting at the whiskey tree with Charles, the warmth of the evening as it lays over them, the sun finally swallowed up by the horizon. Leaving them in nothing but the soft, orange glow of their small fire and the fog of alcohol that pads their minds.

"I don't know why I'm laughin'," Arthur says, realizing that he had been in fact, laughing dumbly to himself. He lifts a heavy hand to rub at his sleepy eyes; when he pulls it away, it's wet. 

"Oh," he says, looks at the way that the light of the fire catches on the tears that have smeared across his palm. He looks over at Charles and exclaims, "I don't know why I'm cryin' neither!"

Charles scoffs, snorts. Turns his body so he's facing Arthur, gestures a bit. "C'mere."

Arthur turns toward him, expression falling a bit. They're very close now, all that Arthur can look at is the deep black-brown of Charles' eyes. He feels frozen, pinned to the spot by them. Charles gently reaches up, and with a touch so careful it wouldn't wake a sleeping kitten, he brushes a tear from Arthur's cheekbone with the pad of his thumb. He looks careful at Arthur's face, at the furious swollen skin of his neck, like a red snake has decided to coil around his throat, to his eyes. A deep blue-green, one of them is severely blood shot. Vessels likely popped as a result of the day's events. He curls his fingers around the back of Arthur's head, safe in the curl of his hand.

"You're a mess," is all that he can say, and there's a thick silence that hangs between the two of them before they both burst out laughing, a sudden swell of joy before they're throwing their arms around one another and falling backwards into the dirt.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Things are happening! Sorry to the people who want a quick romance, I prefer a slow burn myself.
> 
> Comments and the like are very much appreciated!
> 
> [tumblr](https://coyotebrush.tumblr.com)


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi everyone! I'm so sorry for how long it's taken for me to update, for anyone who doesn't follow me on tumblr/didn't read the note of my last fic, I recently moved from Washington state to Colorado and just did not have the time to write! I've had trouble getting back into the swing of writing, so I have mixed feelings about this chapter but I hope that you enjoy it!

Arthur is drawn slowly and carefully back into unconsciousness by something soft and gentle that trails from his temple down to his neck; not ready to wake yet, he turns his head away from the soft warmth with a sigh. The action only exposes his neck further, and the softness grazes along the tender flesh before there's a warbling snort and a gush of hot breath that lays fast over his skin.

Instantly, Arthur is jerking awake. Hauling his sleep heavy body onto an elbow, he squints up at the dark shape that looms over him, partially blotted out by the harsh white sunlight. It's Pearl, and she sticks her long face close to him again, nosing her soot colored snout through his hair and against his ear. He allows it for a moment before placing a palm against her wide cheek and gently pushing her head away.

"Hi girl," He tries to say. It's what he _would_ say, if his throat didn't feel like it had been stitched shut. The words squeeze out rough and garbled, and to speak causes a sharp knife of pain to lance from his collarbones up to the hinges of his jaw. His throat feels heavy and hard, like it's been replaced by a fist-sized stone, horribly swollen, solid and heavy. Arthur can only internally groan, he sits up carefully and does a quick survey of his surroundings, watery images of last night flickering in his mind.

The whiskey tree stands over him like a sentinel, the fire from the previous night smoldering at it's base, embers glowing lowly beneath a cage of charred wood. Charles is nowhere to be seen, and truthfully Arthur can't remember if the other man had camped out there with him at all. He hadn't quite gone to the wind with his drinking last night, but the details are all fuzzy and muted. The evidence of the moonshine a foul taste on his tongue and the back of his throat, as well as within the dull throb that pulsates outside of his eyes and through his skull. Charles had likely left after Arthur had fallen asleep, or had woken up first and left before Arthur had awoken, Taima is gone as well from where she'd been hitched to the tree. Arthur holds no grudges against Charles for making tracks, but the trickle of dejection that curls in his chest makes him fidget and look to the ground, a little shame faced.

He slowly stands up, body protesting. His back aching something fierce from sleeping on the hard ground, despite his padded bed roll. His knees whine as well, leaving Arthur to bemoan the fact that he's only getting older. Years ago, he'd slept on the ground without anything between himself and the grass, and had happily risen without a single twinge or pang. He rubs his fingertips into his eye sockets until he sees spots, grabs the corner of his bed roll and begins to fold it up once more.

Once it's folded up tightly, Arthur tucks it under his arm and scoops up his satchel from where he'd left it among the nearby cluster of rocks, swings it over his shoulder to hang comfortably at his hip. He takes a moment to sit down on one of the rocks, bed roll across his lap. He's so tired, and his body seems to ache from the tips of his ears to his toes. It's a hard, bone deep tiredness that Arthur doesn't think he could wash away if he'd slept in the most luxurious bed much less the hard Heartland ground. With everything that's been happening over the last few months, it's no surprise that he feels absolutely worn out every moment that he's awake. His usual solution to the heart wringing tension that hangs over him like a wet blanket is to drift away from the camp for a few days, find a sliver of solitude. But it seems that now, it's not enough.

There's a clop of hooves against dirt to his back then, and Arthur is glancing over his shoulder, expecting to see Pearl stomping around, maybe frightened by a snake. Or some local coming to wave a gun in his face and tell him to get lost. But instead, it's Charles. He's mounted atop Taima, hunting bow across his back, it's string tight over his broad chest. There are two rabbits strung by their ankles from his saddle, and when he realizes that Arthur is watching him and raises his free hand and gives a loose wave. Arthur drops his folded up bed roll and straightens his back a bit, works his lips as he thinks of something to say.

"Thought you left," is all he says. It's quiet, like a mouse had spoken it. And Charles is tilting his head as he swings Taima over, hops from her back and removes the bow from over his shoulders.

"Come again?" Charles says, hooks the bow onto his saddle and turns around to untie the rabbits.

"I said-," Arthur starts, and then stops when he sees the small, subtle curl of Charles' mouth. 

The words evaporate in an amused exhale, Arthur finding a small smile of his own. He turns away, keeps the little smile to himself and fumbles with the strings wound around his bed roll. Sits for a moment before scooping the thing up into his hands and standing up. He gestures to the rabbits; healthy and young looking animals. A little skinny in their youth, but they look well fed, bellies round.

"Breakfast?"

Charles nods and lays the rabbits down on one of the rocks, he then crouches near the remains of the fire and starts to coax it back to life, rearranges to burnt out logs and stuffs new kindling underneath them. 

"Thought you'd be hungry, didn't see you eat much yesterday."

Arthur flushes, lifts a hand and scratches at his nose. "Yeah, well.." He starts, "I was a little busy."

Charles looks away from the small flame that he's nursed, and meets Arthur's eyes. Dark soulful brown that pulls the air from Arthur's lungs, makes his tongue feel clumsy and heavy. Makes the skin of his face feel prickly and warm. His hand drifts away from his face, rubs his fingers through the hair at the base of his neck. 

"Thank you for catchin' 'em then," he manages to say, dumping his bed roll on the ground and then grabbing the two rabbits by their thin legs, pulls his hunting knife from it's sheath. "I'll skin these critters, since you hunted 'em."

"Okay, sure," Charles says, stands up as well and wipes the black char that stains his hands over his pants. He braces them over his hips and looks Arthur up and down, "how do you feel?"

Arthur shrugs in response, pinches the hide on the back of the first rabbit's neck and makes a nick with his knife, draws the small slice into a clean cut across the width and then slides the blade underneath the skin, separates it from the muscle. 

"Fine, mostly." He starts, "you can probably uh, hear how the throat is." Arthur replaces the blade with his fingers then, grabs hold of the hide and carefully begins to peel it away from the wiry thew.

"It's normal," says Charles, "the swelling. It should go down in a few days or so, with proper care." There's a bit of a warning there, to keep an eye on it. Arthur reminds himself to at least try and do so. Charles drops his hands to his sides and looks around before he steps away from the small fire and moves back over to Taima's side, digs around in her saddlebag and pulls out a tin of coffee. He looks over at Arthur and waves the tin at him. "Got a pot?" He asks, walks back over to Arthur and crouches beside him.

Arthur pulls the rest of the rabbit's hide from it's body, lays it fur-side down on the ground next to him, bloody pink skin to the sun. It's a nice pelt, Charles had killed it very cleanly, small arrow to the base of the skull. 

"'Course," Arthur replies, hands Charles the skinned rabbit and knife, then stands up. Wipes the blood over his thighs, steps around Charles and moves over to Pearl. Because of his penchant for camping away from the gang, he usually keeps his saddlebags filled with enough supplies to sustain. He keeps his percolator and tin cup tied to one of the cinch straps of the saddle, as they won't fit proper into the saddlebag. Arthur undoes the tie, then says to Charles over his shoulder.

"I only have the one mug, that alright?"

"I don't mind," Charles tells him with a small shrug. Focused on his gutting of the rabbit, shearing off the edible flesh with a dutiful precision. "We can share."

"We can share," Arthur murmurs back, too quiet for Charles to hear. He sidles back over to the fire and starts up on the coffee. Within ten minutes, they have several strips of rabbit meat cooked as well as a nice pot of coffee. Arthur fills the tin cup with the hot black brew and hands it to Charles, who takes it wordlessly, heat from the liquid streaming out into the mild air. 

"Will you be able to eat okay?" Charles ask suddenly, eyes on the piece of meat that Arthur was in the process of ferrying toward his mouth. He stops, teeth poised to bite before lowering the food almost sadly.

"I don't rightly know," he says, the sighs. "Still got my knife?"

Charles nods and plucks up Arthur's knife from he'd set it aside. Arthur takes it and cuts a near paper-thin slice from the strip; it's easy to chew, small as it is, but to swallow it hurts still. The sore stiffness in his throat is deep and heavy, but the quick action of swallowing down the meat brings a sharp, hot pain. Like he'd tried to eat a small flame. Arthur carefully clears his throat and reaches gentle fingers to touch at his neck. He finds his face heating up in loose embarrassment as he can feel Charles' eyes on him.

Arthur sighs, mutters and gestures to his throat, "the next few days are gonna fun, with this."

"You'll live I think," Charles says wryly, takes another sip of the coffee and hands the mug to Arthur. "I doubt drinking is going to be any easier."

Arthur snorts and takes a drink. As expected, it hurts. Burns much more than swallowing the meat did, he coughs a bit at the sensation of the heated liquid sliding over the aching tissue, coffee dribbling down his chin. He quickly wipes his face and hands the mug back to Charles. "You can have the rest," he splutters, "best I just stick to water."

They sit in silence for a moment, quietly eating and lazing within the easy and warm presence of one another. After Arthur manages to finish off one piece of the meat, settling somewhat uncomfortably in his stomach, he wipes his knife off and slips it back into it's sheath. Leans back and squints up the sky.

"Should be gettin' back to camp now," He says, settles forward and braces his hands on his knees, stands with a small grunt. Scoops up the pot of coffee and dumps it onto the fire, snuffing out the small flames. Charles nods, finishes off the piece of meat he'd been chewing on, wraps the remaining slices of meat into a cloth, picks up the rabbit skins, and stands up as well.

"We should uh, ride back in separately." Arthur says awkwardly, turns to pick up his bed roll and walks over to Pearl's side, begins to tie the supplies to her saddle. "Don't wanna give anyone any... ideas."

"I don't really care what kind of ideas anyone back at camp gets." Charles says back to him, strolls over to Taima and pats her dark colored face. She pushes her nose into his forehead. "Do you?"

Arthur pauses on that, fiddles with the saddle ties. Steps away from Pearl and scoops up his hat from where it had been set on a rock. He doesn't remember placing it there last night, or even removing it. He flips it up and settles it atop his head, rakes his hair back and out of his face first. Dry Heartland heat sending drops of sweat to dot his temples. 

"I don't know." He answers, lamely. "I care when their 'ideas' could have consequences."

There's a beat of silence, before Charles responds in a cool voice, "right."

The flatness of it has Arthur averting his eyes as he grabs hold of Pearl's saddle horn and hauls himself up onto her back, leans back into the cantle. "In this world, you gotta hide yourself sometimes."

"Oh, I'm aware of that." Charles replies as he mounts up onto his own horse, pulls her reins up into his hands. He swings Taima around to face the direction of camp, he looks over his shoulder at Arthur before saying. "But you shouldn't always 'hide' yourself for other people's sake." 

He doesn't leave Arthur any room to respond before speaking again, "I'll ride back first; see you later."

Arthur watches as Charles spurs off, eyes on his back as he tears across the dry Earth, until he dips down over the hill and is out sight. He sighs, picks up his own reins and guides Pearl to face the other direction. 

"Catch you later, then." Arthur mumbles, heart caught in a despondent vice.

\----

The next few days are slow and hot, the thick and near soupy air of Lemoyne has most of the gang laying low and quiet. Work is getting done, but at a less hurried pace. A familiar and somewhat complacent air had fallen over the camp, much to Grimshaw's chagrin. The comfort seemingly induced by Dutch's confidence regarding the Gray's and Braithwaite's. Arthur however, feels uneasy. He's felt uneasy for a while now, but it's been amped up since this whole charade began. Thoughts of it all going wrong racing through his mind at a near constant pace.

It's later in the day, sun beginning to set and sweltering heat slowly dying down, and Arthur has just eaten two entire bowls of stew. Primarily, because the swelling of his throat had gone down some, and he could finally eat more than small bites of mush. It still hurt, but not nearly as much as it had previously, and he was willing to bear the remaining pain if it meant a comfortably full stomach. He may have gained a newfound appreciation for Pearson's cooking in the wake of it all.

Content, and perhaps a little tired, Arthur moves away from the chuckwagon toward his own wagon, ready to settle down and prepare for whatever tomorrow might hold. Yesterday, he'd robbed a stagecoach with Bill and Tilly. It had been a bit of a mess, the two bickering all the while. Bill deserved whatever dirt Tilly had to sling at him, but the lack of cohesion had nearly cost them the score. Arthur had barely been able to run down the coach and hop aboard, but he'd done it. The only lives lost were that of the coach guards, and they'd rode away with a moderate take of $25. Today, he'd taken it easy. And would back out there tomorrow, meeting with Hosea and Sean at the Braithwaite place to discuss _some_ sort of business and personally, Arthur liked a bit of prep time before rubbing elbows with rich folk.

He slows to a stop when he spots Javier sitting nearby, fiddling with the line of a fishing pole. Javier seems to notice Arthur's presence, looking up from his task and then standing quickly.

"Arthur!" Javier starts, "do you want to go fishing with me?"

"Fishing?" Arthur says, then waves him off. "I'm no good at it, you know that."

Javier sets the pole down to lean against the tree and strides over to Arthur, "you don't have to be good at fishing to enjoy it."

"Maybe," Arthur replies with a lame shrug, puts his hands on his hips. "But I don't think you can have fun fishing if you ain't catchin' anything."

Javier thumps his hand over Arthur's shoulder, "no problem, _mi amigo_. I'll catch all of the fish, you can sit back and relax."

Arthur sighs, shakes his head, eyes on the ground. Ultimately, he relents. He'd actually like to get out of camp and do something other than robbing folk, so he shrugs, looks back up at Javier.

"Alright," he says, "hope you know a good spot."

"The best," Javier replies, corner of his mouth quirked into a small curl. Uses the hand he'd placed on Arthur's shoulder to give him a gentle shove in the direction of the horse hitches.

They mount up and ride out quick, poles and tackle loaded onto Javier's saddle. They ride past Sean, who's on patrol, and he yells something after them about being bored and never getting to leave camp. Arthur can only smile amusedly at that, tucks his chin close to his chest and pulls Pearl up close to the side of Javier's horse, Boaz. They slow down once they're out of the small forest that surrounds camp.

"So, Javier." Arthur starts, keeps his voice low and careful. "This place you talked about, is it private?"

"Very," Javier says, gives Arthur a coy look. "Scoped it out, checked the doors and windows. Should be real easy to keep locked."

Arthur nods, flicks the reins. "Good."

It was an arrangement they'd made, last night, when most of the camp had gone to bed. Javier sheepish, beating around the bush. Arthur catching on to what he'd wanted almost instantly, familiar with the behavior.

"I know that it's.. been a while." Javier had said, taking a drag from the cigarette they were sharing, handed it over to Arthur, who took his own drag. He breathes the smoke out slow, moves to lean back against one of the trees that stand behind them. Arthur nods, blows smoke from his nose and flicks away the cigarette, burned to a stump now.

"I can pay." Javier is quick so say after that, an almost nervous edge to his voice. Arthur doesn't blame him. He shrugs, and leans back as well.

"No," he decides, says carefully. "You don't have to. But I'll take up the offer anyway."

They come up with a front for the gang, and decide to hold off until tomorrow evening.

And now here they were, riding to a location that Javier had found for them to fuck in. Arthur kept quiet as they rode, thoughts swirling a bit in his mind. He didn't quite understand why he was doing this; he liked Javier well enough, enjoyed himself the last time that they'd had sex. But he'd found himself wanting again.

It always came back, that deep seated want to lose himself in someone else, let them fill in all the holes and cracks in his soul. Arthur was a fool for it; the relief and heart filling sensation of being desired by another person. He couldn't deny himself of it for long, and it's been nearly two weeks since he'd bedded with someone. The previous days had been filled with stress and discomfort, aches and pains plaguing his body, his conflicted feelings toward Charles mugging up his mind and twisting up his heart. He enjoyed spending time with the other man, but each second was another tick on what wouldn't happen. Arthur didn't know how Charles felt about having relations with other men, but he knew how Charles felt about relationships with himself, and as much as it pained him. Left him feeling silly and sick, he respected that.

Arthur needed to keep his mind away from it all, and a night with Javier could at least be a soothing balm to the current roughed up texture of his life.

He perks up once they crest over a low hill, Javier turning to speak to him, "Should just be up here. In these trees."

Sure enough, the end up winding through a thick copse of trees, and hidden within them is a small shack. It's not much, must have been a home at some point. It has a small porch, a few windows, a chimney. Thankfully, it's clearly abandoned. It's few windows appear to be boarded up; the door looks like it had been boarded up as well, but recently broken down. Clearly by Javier. 

Arthur tugs on Pearl's reins to slow her down, hops from her back once she stutters to a halt. He hitches her to one of the banisters of the porch and gives the place a quick survey, turns to Javier as he dismounts from Boaz. "Looks comfortable." He sighs, mildly teasing.

Javier gives him a sarky look, gives Boaz's black and white neck a pat before hitching him and stepping away toward the shack. 

"Come on," he says, gestures for Arthur to follow.

Arthur steps after him, looks around once he's inside the place. It's dark, and musty. Not much by way of furniture, there's a table in the corner, a fireplace in the center that bisects it the small space into two rooms. Once he's sufficiently locked up the door, Javier grabs an unlit oil lantern that's sat atop the table and walks past Arthur, tips his head toward one of the doorways aside the fireplace. 

"This way."

The other half is just as bare bones, another small table against the wall and a broken shelf in the the corner, two boarded up windows on either side, red orange light filtering between the planks. There are several blankets stretched over a laid out bed roll in the corner, which Javier meekly gestures toward. 

"Sorry there's no bed," he says, places the lantern on the nearby table, pulls a matchbook from his pocket and proceeds to light it. Shakes out the match once it's lit and tosses it aside.

Arthur shrugs, lifts his hands and works his suspenders off from his shoulders. "I've fucked in worse places."

He's not wearing a shirt today, just his union suit to cover himself. The sickly heavy heat of Lemoyne seemed to have been at an all time high today, any ideas of wearing a button up had been pushed away when he'd awoken practically drenched in sweat.

Javier steps close then, as Arthur begins undoing the buttons on his union suit, wraps his fingers over Arthur's wrist, replaces his hands with his own and starts unthreading the buttons himself.

Pulls two of them out before he's pushing in and pressing his lips against Arthur's in a long, drawn out kiss. This spurs Arthur into action, his hands move and grab onto the lapels of Javier's jacket, shoving the things down as far as he can. Javier laughs against his mouth, a little breathless, and takes a quick step back to yank his jacket off from his shoulders and toss it aside. After losing more clothing, Arthur in nothing but the pants of his union suit and Javier in his jeans, they make a quick transition to the makeshift bed that Javier had set up.

Javier settles himself close between Arthur's legs, fronts of his thighs firm against the backs of Arthur's, growing member hard against the crease of Arthur's pelvis. 

"How long's it been for you?" Arthur asks on an exhale, eyelids fluttering as Javier takes his face in his hands, thumbs on his cheekbones and fingers in his hair.

"Almost a month," Javier mumbles, forehead against Arthur's. He tilts his head to the side a bit and mashes his mouth against Arthur's again, Arthur pushing up into the kiss with equal energy. "Back in Valentine; had a girl there."

Arthur hums, relishes in the heat of Javier's lips and palms. Places his own hands against Javier's flanks, skin warm underneath the spread of his fingers. 

"Ain't been too long, for me." He says, "worked with a fellar maybe a week ago or so."

"Was it good?" Javier asks, leaning back just a bit, slides his hands from Arthur's face down over his chest, gentle and reverent fingers on his skin, almost feather-light. He trails his soft touches downward until he hooks his fingers under the thin cotton of Arthur's underwear, gives it a small tug. Arthur complies and lifts himself up a bit, lets Javier pull his clothing away.

"Not really," Arthur admits, face warming up at the way the Javier's eyes rove over his naked body. He settles back into the blankets a bit, lifts his arms above his head and crosses them, spreads his legs a bit wider.

"I'll make this good for you," Javier says quickly, swoops back in to cover Arthur once more, draws his hands from Arthur's hips up to his chest, cups his breasts and kneads them as he pushes his lips against Arthur's. It's a hard, quick kiss before Javier is moving his mouth down against the ridge of his jaw, then down to his neck. Arthur flinches, just a bit at the attention that Javier gives the still sensitive flesh, skin still slightly red and bruised. Javier notices, murmurs a muted, "sorry," before moving downward further to charm Arthur's collarbones.

Arthur sighs, practically preens and brings his arms down to hook over Javier's shoulders, press his palms flat against the skin. Tilts his head away just a bit in order to give Javier better access to his flesh.

As Javier continues to pet and ravish Arthur, he starts working his hips in a low grind into the space between Arthur's spread legs, pressing in hot and hard. His cock now stiff and impatient in the confines of his pants; Arthur's own cock has grown needy as well, the pressure of Javier pressing him to him sends enjoyable pulses through his nerves, pushing sharp little breathes from his throat.

Finally, Javier pulls one hand away from where he'd been holding it steady to Arthur's side, fumbles to undo the buttons of his jeans. It's quick work, and he's rising just a bit to shove them below his knees, ready cock springing free. Javier had never been one to wear any form of underwear, making it all the easier to undress. 

"You're incredible, Arthur," Javier says in a low and puffed out voice, lays his body close over Arthur's, leaving no space between the hot press of their skin. Hard member a scorching line against Arthur's groin. Arthur wraps his arms steady over the width of Javier's back, draws the fingers of one hand up and down the length of his spine, the other settles at the nape of his neck, works the tie out of Javier's dark hair. It falls around his face as he leans in and kisses Arthur once more, breathes hard against mouth and presses his forehead to Arthur's. He reaches out for the tin of vaseline that he'd brought, sat next to the makeshift bed.

Arthur lets out a wheezy laugh, drops his arms from around Javier's shoulder and lays them over his head once more, gives full access of his body to the other man. "You ain't the first one to tell me that."

Javier leans away from Arthur just a bit, unscrews the lid from the tin and slips his fingers into the viscous substance, swirls his fingers into it. "Maybe," he says, voice rough, "but I actually mean it."

He sets the tin aside and lays himself close to Arthur again, wastes no time and placing his hand between Arthur's legs, slides them in through the soft flesh of his ass and carefully into the molten heat at his core. Arthur keens and clenches his jaw a bit at the pressure, Javier's fingers teasing and working into him with a clean deftness. Each further press of the the length of them sends hot sparks straight to Arthur's cock, fills his chest with a flighty warmth. He can feel his heart thundering in his ears, curling his toes as Javier takes a moment to apply more vaseline to his fingers, then scoops them back into Arthur's body. He then sets a rhythm, pumping them in and out in a sweet hot slide that pushes the air from Arthur's lungs. Javier toils his fingers in as deep as he can, knuckles pressed against the stretched out opening, tight and wet against the bone. He holds them deep inside and spreads them against the muscle, softening and opening him up.

"Okay," Javier murmurs, pulls his fingers out and grabs the tin again, pulls out a generous amount of vaseline and rubs it over the length of his cock. Arthur watches greedily as Javier takes a moment to work his hand up and down his shaft, spreading the slick as evenly as he can. Eyes fluttering closed at the pleasure of it.

"Are you ready?" He asks, pulls himself up and over Arthur, eyes burning into him. Arthur nods, slides his hands into Javier's hair and pulls him down into a slow, deep kiss. Moves his arms to brace over Javier's shoulder and wiggles a bit to hook his thighs over Javier's own, his weeping cock tight in the close press of their bodies.

"'Course."

Javier gives him a small, soft smile. Presses one hand against the side of Arthur's face, using his other hand to line himself up. Leaking head of his cock close between Arthur's cheeks, pressed against his opening without quite breaching the tight ring of muscle. He draws Arthur into a kiss as he slowly pushes in, moaning into Arthur's mouth at the almost burning heat of him, body constricting tight and wet around his cock.

Arthur breaks the kiss and tips his head back with a groan at the shimmering feeling of Javier's dick squeezing into him, a hot iron bar that settles heavy in his stomach. Sends pulses of pleasurable warmth up to his ears and down to his toes. He uses a hand to wipe sweaty hair his forehead, meets Javier's eyes and gives him a little nod to keep going. Javier takes it, hooks one arm under Arthur's neck, the other worms it's way under to curl around the small of his back. His starts careful, slow. Mindful of Arthur, always. A deep, attentive grind that _pushes_ the hot, hard pressure of his cock into all the right places. The head of it pressing into Arthur's guts, punching gasps quick out his throat.

Pressing his lips against Arthur's neck again, Javier breathes and groans as he picks up the pace, impatient body seeking release. He pumps his cock even and rigid into Arthur, heated skin of his thighs slap audibly against Arthur's with each skillful push.

Arthur loses himself in the feeling of it all, the pressure and heat of Javier's cock in his stomach sends sparking shocks throughout his body, each thrust sending a burst of prickling rapture along the length of his own cock. The nerves inside of him practically singing at the sweet drag of Javier's cock, ridge hot and hard against the soft, slick tissue.

Javier's thrusts start to turn sloppy as release begins to boil in his gut, a warm buildup that presses up behind his groin. He removes his arm from underneath Arthur's back, slides it between their bodies and wraps his fingers around Arthur's length, collects his pre-cum with his thumb and uses it to ease the way as he begins to pump his hand along Arthur's cock. Arthur practically shouting at the bursting sensation that it causes, his legs constrict quick around Javier's back, toes curling tight. Javier smirks just a bit as works to time his thrusts with each pump of his hand, satisfaction creeping over him at the utter pleasure that he's bringing Arthur.

Arthur unwinds his arms from Javier's shoulders again and lays them limp, palms up by his head. Unable to do anything other than surrender to what Javier is providing for him, tears prickle in his eyes as he can feel release expand out from where Javier's cock is spreading him open, tingling up the length of his cock, warm and full in the cradle of Javier's hand. A broken moan worms out from his throat, he tilts his head back and lets himself go. Pleasure from his orgasm filling his body with fluttery warmth, honey-smooth and sweet, eyes practically rolling back into his head.

The sight is enough to tip Javier over, he's quick to release Arthur's spent dick and brace his hand hard against the blanket, deliver two more stuttering thrusts into the warmth of Arthur's body before finishing deep into the warm passage of him. Presses his body close into Arthur's, eliminating any space between their skin, lips finding Arthur's again in a breathless and sloppy kiss. 

They lay there for a moment, breathing and gasping as the waves of release begin to die down, leaving them sensitive and tired. Javier carefully peels himself away from Arthur, pulls out with a slight hiss and pushes strands of dark hair from his sweaty face, looks down at him, drinking in Arthur's completely debauched appearance. "You okay?"

There's a beat before Arthur answers, eyes closed and face angled toward the ceiling. 

"Yeah, I'm okay." Arthur answers, voice gravelly and weak. He sighs, lifts a hand and rubs it over his eyes and forehead, watching as Javier leans back to sit on his heels.

"Stay put," Javier says. "I'll take care of you."

Arthur nods, wordless. Heart skipping and throbbing in his ears, sleepy complacency falling over him. Javier stands, crossing the room to removing a few items from the table before returning to the makeshift bed, Arthur uses what little energy he has left he scoot over, give Javier some room.

Javier cleans himself up a bit before pulling his pants back up and buttoning them closed, opens the pack of cigarettes that he'd retrieved and pulls one out with his teeth. He offers one to Arthur, and Arthur takes it gladly. Javier lights his cigarette with a match, then hands it to Arthur so he can light his own. He then hands Arthur a rag, which he uses to wipe clean his stomach, between his cheeks, before grabbing one of the blankets and pulling it up over his hips. He braces himself on an elbow, plucks the cig from between his lips and puffs out the smoke.

"Was it good?" Javier asks, seating himself on the bedroll next to Arthur.

Arthur nods, flicks the ash from the cigarette.

"Yeah," he says. "It was pretty good."

Javier gives him a smile then, before looking over across the room and continuing to work on smoking his cigarette. Arthur watches him for a moment before looking away, the back of his neck prickling. He wasn't lying, it had been a pretty good fuck. Definitely better than his last time, but there's something small that stirs in his chest. Uncomfortable, it curls over itself and sits like a slimy parasite. It's a pang that makes him feel guilty, and wrong. Like he'd just done something he shouldn't have.

He can't help it, but all he can think about in that moment is Charles.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In this household we love and appreciate bottom Arthur. (Also as usual apologies for any typos that slipped past me)
> 
> Comments and the like are very much appreciated!
> 
> [tumblr](https://coyotebrush.tumblr.com)


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi! I am so sorry that it's taken me this long to update, I absolutely haven't given up on this fic and have no plans of doing so, but my life has just been supremely busy with my move across states and my new job. I simply haven't had the time to write, and have been low on motivation since now I'm working a lot, but I digress! I plan on updating a little more frequently from now on, as my schedule is starting to calm down a bit. This chapter is a bit shorter than I'm typically satisfied with, but I couldn't figure out a way to lengthen it without disrupting my story layout.

Arthur is distracted; it's not an uncommon feeling for him. But it leaves him vulnerable, dulls his edges, mind preoccupied with unwelcome thoughts. Lost in the swaying motion of the horse between his legs as he rides a careful pace on the heels of Dutch and Micah. They're speaking, but the words don't quite meet Arthur's ears, unable to pierce the cottony buffer of worry and musings that plague him.

He has little confidence in this current endeavor, and tries to hide it while keeping his concerns capped behind his teeth. It wouldn't do well to fan doubt at whatever fire is burning away at Dutch's brain, Arthur doesn't want to put that on him. But any reasonable fellar would discern the flaws with the plan that is being enacted. Hosea had seen though it all immediately, and if it had been several months earlier, he may have been able to convince Dutch to do the same.

Arthur had ridden into camp in the late of that morning, separate from Javier, a bit tired, a bit sore in both the wrong and right places. Light on his feet, head feeling heavy. Loose and comfortable in post coitus, despite the storm clouds gathered around his ears. He'd barely dismounted from Pearl's back, hand on her flank when there's a tingle on the back of his neck, a corpse-like shiver that raises hairs in it's path as it worms up his spine and nestles at the base of his skull. He scowls, looks over his shoulder and greets darkly.

"Micah."

Micah puts his hands up, palms open, in a weak gesture of surrender. "Woah there, cowpoke." He starts, voice condescending like he's speaking to a young child, or an animal. "No need to be so hostile."

"What'chu want?" Arthur asks as he ties Pearl's reins to the hitch, pats her neck and steps away toward his tent, brushing past Micah as he does so.

"What do I want?" Micah muses, Arthur spares him a glance and grimaces at the grimy smirk plastered over his face, prepares himself for some kind of lecherous and teasing barb. Arthur cannot say that he's in the mood to be pestered by Micah, not that he ever is. But he's been justifiably testy as of late and thinks it wouldn't take much deriding to set him off; it would be so effortless, to cock back a ready fist and plow it hard into Micah's nose. Arthur could easily imagine the crackle of cartilage giving way under his knuckles. He catches the flashing prurience in Micah's eyes, shaded under the brim of his hat, the little uptick on the corner of his mouth, his head is ducked down just a little bit as he seems to regard Arthur with a devil-like fervor. Arthur has seen plenty of rattlers in his day, and while Micah may look nothing like one, the only word that crosses his mind when he looks upon the man is _snake_.

Micah, to his credit, seems to pick up on the tension. He waves a loose hand in Arthur's direction, looks lazily across the camp and blandly placates. "It ain't nothin' like that, girly."

"Really?" Arthur grouses, sarcasm sharpening the word. He begins undoing the buttons of his shirt, peels it away before tossing it aside and kicking open his clothing trunk with his foot, crouches to search for something cleaner to wear, knees protesting with the bend.

"'Course," Micah says, puts his hands on his hips and struts a slow circle around Arthur, watching him like a vulture would a dying deer. "We got business, that's all."

"'Business'," Arthur mutters back, pulling out his old blue summer shirt and standing up from his tight crouch. The thing is practically threadbare, mismatched buttons sewn along the placket of it, replacements as it's original buttons had all been lost to time. He shoves his arm into the shirt and pulls it up over his back, carefully mindful of his still healing shoulder. "What sorta 'business'?"

"Well, definitely not 'your' kind of business" Micah tells him pointedly, smirk curling along his lips again. He places a hand over Arthur's shoulder, fingers pushing just a little bit too hard into the meat of his neck muscle, and provides a small push toward Dutch's tent. "But somethin' I think could benefit _all_ of us."

Somehow, Arthur had sat back and let Micah sweet talk Dutch into an alleged parlay with Colm O'Driscoll. In hindsight, he perhaps should have been more insistent that it was likely not a good idea, or supported Hosea on his declaration that the whole thing was a trap. But he hadn't. In all honestly, Arthur feels that it all would have done more harm than good to make a fuss. Dutch.. had not been himself lately. Arthur watched him carefully and closely, saw his rigid posture and wild eyes. At this point, he'd rather roll over to Dutch than to butt heads with him. So he stays silent, and loyal.

He's jarred from his thoughts when Dutch says stiffly, "Up there, those are Colm's boys."

Arthur looks up, squints across the arid Earth to the small group of men clustered on the top of distant hill, familiar emerald colored bandanas tied around each of their necks. 

"Great," Micah says, kicks his heels into Baylock's flanks, earning a rough snort from the horse. "Right on time then."

They pick up their pace, tailing on after the three or so men to the 'designated' meeting spot. Somewhere both open and hidden at the same time, deep among the rock formations that dot across the dry and hazy countryside of the Heartlands. They ride around the base of a low mesa, and it's before they crest the low dirt rise that leads down into where this parlay would be taking place that Dutch is slowing his horse with a light tug of the reins, swinging him around a bit to face Arthur. He points up toward the top of the mesa, "up there." He tells him," you keep an eye on us from up on that cliff. If anything happens, God forbid, you'll have a good vantage point."

Arthur looks up at the thing questionably, but nods, sighs. Turns Pearl and gently pushes her to begin scaling the rocky slope that lines the formation, "alright. But if this things goes sideways, let's meet at the fork in the road back there."

Dutch merely nods; a stony, far away look on his face. Micah lurking like a gargoyle over his shoulder. They split off, and Arthur tries to steel his nerves as he rises over the lip of the hill onto the top of the mesa. From this high up, he can see far across the prairie, dry yellow and green stretching and rolling off into the distance. He can see Dutch and Micah, both mere specks on the ground, as well as Colm and a few of his men. He dismounts off from Pearl's back and removes the Rolling Block from her saddle, checks the breech to make sure that it's loaded.

As Arthur approaches the edge of the mesa, he startles away a vulture that had been feeding on a corpse of some kind, inky black wings stretching wide as it launches itself into the air, letting out a startled shriek. Arthur watches the bird as it goes, and then carefully lowers himself to his knees, then to his belly. Carefully, slowly, crawls toward the overhang until he can see clearly over the edge, lines the rifle snug and comfortable against his body, gently lays his fingers near the trigger, and rules up the sight to his eye line. The lens of the scope is filthy and cracked, Arthur squints into it and grimaces, but precisely adjusts his positioning until he's got a clear view of the meeting down below.

Dutch is standing ram-rod still, with Micah holding ground a few feet behind him. His head is tilted back, just a bit, hands hovering near his holsters. Colm, on the other hand, looks relaxed. 

Comfortable, he gestures, struts around, seems to be enjoying himself. Arthur sneers down at him, drags the cross-hair and lays it over the man's head, clean on his temple. He won't take the shot of course, but imagines doing so. Thinks about what would happen; his boys would likely start shooting immediately, but Arthur has no doubts that Dutch and Micah would be able to deal with them easily. Dutch would probably be upset with him, very upset, but this stupid, turbulent war between the two would all be over. The fighting and feuding that had been a constant in Arthur's life since Dutch and Hosea has taken him in.

He moves the cross-hair away from Colm, slides it over to Micah. If he took this shot, it would be a lot harder to explain and justify to Dutch, but personally, Arthur feels that it would save them a great deal of trouble in the future.

Sighing, a hard exhale through the nose, Arthur pulls the scope away from his face for a moment, rubs at his eye, irritated from the dust on the lens. It's a small action, takes barely twenty seconds, but as Arthur is pulling his hand away from his face, before looking back into the scope, he sees it. A flicker of darkness, the finest makings of a shadow, he thinks for a second that it's the vulture, returning to finish it's meal. But in that quick instance, his mind screams at him that he's wrong, it's not a bird, the shadow isn't shaped right. There's a clear, defined human shape; shoulders, the brim of a hat, arms up and poised. It's holding something, a weapon? And it's closing in over him. Twenty seconds.

Arthur rolls over from his stomach to his back; hard and quick, sending up a cloud of dust and grit. He draws his arms up over his face as the man standing above him swings down his weapon, the butt of a shotgun. It hits, hard, into Arthur's forearms. Splits the flesh open, radius and ulna bones shuddering and creaking under the impact. Arthur barks out a cry of pain as the force of the blow plows his arm into his nose; there's a nauseating crunch and a hot tumble of blood over his lips, down his throat. 

The man, an O'Driscoll, emerald on his neck, stumbles in surprise. Clearly not expecting Arthur to have noticed his presence, Arthur uses that to his advantage and kicks hard at him, catching the man in the stomach. He lets out an _oof_ as the kick knocks the wind out from his lungs, and Arthur is scrabbling to his feet, grabbing the rifle from where he'd dropped it to swing it at the O'Driscoll's head like a baseball bat. There's a crack and a whip of blood that paints the air as the man drops solid and still into the dirt. The second he hits the ground, Arthur is turning on his heels, sucking in a breath to shout out for Dutch. It's a trap, of course it was. Hosea knew, and Arthur should have known better. His shout however, gets caught in his throat as someone is wrapping an arm around his throat and yanking him back away from the cliff edge. He stumbles, drops the rifle, cursing and squirming in the new attacker's grip. 

He shoves an elbow back into the other man's body, catching him hard on the hip bone. It sends a painful and electrifying shock all the way up to Arthur's finger tips, but it gets the man to loosen his grip just enough that Arthur can break out from his hold and shove him away, reach for his Cattleman where it sits at his hip. He just needs to get one shot off, and it should be enough to alert Dutch and Micah. His fingers barely brush the grip of the gun before he's being tackled from behind. There's a third man, apparently.

He lands on his belly, breath stolen again, and there are hands on his neck. They barely squeeze before Arthur is writhing wildly, rolling over and grabbing the man's wrists, yanking them away as hard as he can and kicking his legs in a frenzy to get the O'Driscoll away. It's sloppy, but Arthur is bigger than him. He manages to land a successful kick in man's parts, causing him to gasp and drop like a rock, curling in on himself and groaning in a deeply pained voice. Arthur yanks himself up, again. Heart bucking erratic and hard in his chest like a bad hoss. The skin of his throat tingling and prickling, rough scratch of rope of phantom feeling wrapped tight and close around his neck. He has a scant moment to get a handle on the situation, manages to pull his Cattleman from it's holster before the remaining man is barreling into him, snatching his wrist away from his holster and punching Arthur in the face. Arthur's gun clatters to the dirt, his teeth rattling.

"This coulda been real easy," The O'Driscoll says, face red with anger, spit flying. He seems just as strong, if not stronger than Arthur. They push and struggle against one another with the ferocity of bulls with their horns locked; the O'Driscoll pushing close and mean into Arthur's face. Arthur sneers, sees an opening and spits a glob of foamy blood into his attacker's eyes. The man shouts, frustration and surprise, his muscles relent for the briefest of moments and Arthur is quick to overtake him, land a crushingly hard punch to the man's temple with an angry growl, then throw his teetering body aside. He doesn't get back up. Out of options and unable to quickly locate his gun, Arthur decides that cutting and running may be his best choice. He whistles, high and shrill for Pearl, who had wandered off to graze. Disoriented, Arthur makes a stumbling run down the hill, looking around wildly for his horse. She's coming into sight then from off to the right of his vision, an ice white flash against the muddy yellow stretch of land. 

She's maybe ten or so feet from meeting him, Arthur ready to jump onto her back and gun it hard to where Dutch is, trusting the strength of his horse to hightail away quicker than the O'Driscoll can regain his bearings, when there's a shot. It's ear-shatteringly close, echoing into a harsh layer of noise that ricochets from the walls of the nearby rock formations, and there's fire in Arthur's leg. Blindly hot and splitting pain that spreads quick through his right calf, knocks sharp static numbness into his toes and a deep rolling throb to his kneecap. Bastard shot him, and it barely processes before Arthur's leg is giving out underneath him, pain so sharp it that sends tears to blur over his eyes, he barely has time to shield his face before making a hard impact with the ground.

The momentum from his sprint cut loose, Arthur finds himself tumbling heel over head down the slope of the hill, tight packed Earth and rocks sending harsh shocks through his body with each roll. Pearl stutters in her gallop and rears, bellow roiling out from her throat and legs kicking out into the air, she's turning quick away from Arthur and tearing hard across the ground, terrified whinnies carrying behind her. 

Arthur groans, swears and spits as he rolls to a stop. Snot and tears and blood on his face, he squints up at the blinding sunlight and tries to regain his breath, his thoughts, mind scrambled from the rough fall and every nerve absolutely ablaze, cruel fire that spreads through his leg like a venom. He can feel the blood welling up in his boot, wet between his toes. He tries to move, whine caught sharp as the slight action sends waves of pure _hurt_ to spread though all of his limbs, his back, his neck. His head is pounding and swimming, and it feels like he'll never breath properly again. 

He wheezes, lifts his head just a bit, hears the scrabble of rocks as someone draws near. A shadow falls over him, a silvery outline of sunlight wrapped around the man that stands over him, his form darkened and blotted out. There's almost two of him, Arthur's unfocused eyes stretching and warping him into something different, unrecognizable from a human, something he can't quite place. But it makes him scared. He blinks away the bleary film of dirt and tears and gains better focus on the sight before him.

The mouth of shotgun, little more than a foot away from his face. Arthur freezes, stomach going cold, the pain his leg suddenly going sharp as glass and dull as mud all at once. The man's posture is sloppy, legs cocked from the harsh kick to the nethers he'd received, Arthur could maybe knock him over with enough force. Though from where he's laying, Arthur isn't sure he could deliver on that.

"'Course the great Arthur Morgan had to go 'n make this hard," the O'Driscoll spits down at him, mouth twisted up. He stumbles closer, stands over Arthur like a hunter over his prize, shoves the shot gun closer until the mouth his pressed snug against his shoulder, grin curling along his lips. "Can't kill ya, but I can teach ya a lesson."

The world is pulled out from under Arthur in a quick rush, confusion, pain, and fear overwhelming him into a stunned and still silence, almost unable to react as the man is pulling the trigger of the shotgun and unloading molten hot buckshot into the meat of his shoulder, sinking deep and burning into the flesh, practically melting away cloth and skin in a ruddy blast that jolts Arthur's entire body, nearly has his vision whiting out with the pure pain of it all. He holds onto the barest thread of consciousness, sight of the O'Driscoll standing over him flickering in and out like a dying candle. He can't feel his left hand and the back of his neck is growing itchy and hot with the blood the slides under it, down the hill through the dusty dirt, tacks up his hair.

Then, there's another shot. 

The grin falters and drops off from the O'Driscolls face in an instant, a line of blood slides down from the neat little hole in his forehead, and he's leaning to the side, then dropping to the ground. His body slides, just a bit, then stills to a halt, a dark bar of blood stretching out from his dark hair.

Arthur stares at the body, unblinking, for a moment, glazey stillness overtaking him. He cranes his neck, can only move it a little, and looks with upside down sight at his approaching rescuer. Milk white horse, black gambler hat. Behind that, the sheen of light along a leather jacket.

He sighs then, a ragged sound, and sags into the ground, black spots grow and fester at the corners of his sight. Deep aches pulsating throughout his worn over body, furiously numbing. 

" _Arthur_ ", Dutch is exclaiming as he clambers down from The Count's back, stumbling in his haste and dropping to his knees, curls over Arthur and looks to his face, hand on the side of his head, the other hovering, unsure and overwhelmed. As Arthur looks up at Dutch, at the silver line of sun that borders around hunched his form, face and body little more than a darkened, black shadow. Suddenly, like the strike of a match, he finds a good word to place what he sees. Death.

Behind loose, bloody teeth and the heavy chains of hurt that weigh down his very being, Arthur manages to weakly grouse out the words, "told you it was a set-up, Dutch..."

Maybe Dutch says something, maybe there's an expression of regret on his face, but Arthur can't hear it, can't see it. His eyelids feel heavier than a freight; he feels like he's floating, darkness curling around him and pulling him into the Earth. Far away from Dutch, from Micah, from the gang and the Pinkertons, the government and the rest of the world. And it's in those few seconds that his overworked mind wanes into a honey slick unconsciousness, that for the first time in a long time, Arthur feels a moment of pure bliss.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Poor Arthur can't catch a break, but his shitty life is canon so what's new lol
> 
> Comments and the like are very much appreciated!
> 
> [tumblr](https://coyotebrush.tumblr.com)


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